The benefits of an ice bath for injured athletes or even gen pop are endless. Not only are they beneficial for injuries but also internally as well. Ice baths or swims in the freezing ocean, also known as “cold water immersion”, are an immensely popular way to recover from exercise. They’re used by athletes of all abilities worldwide after many different types of training. Ice baths are used to reduce symptoms of muscle soreness, and maintain the results gained from training sessions in strength and endurance.
For instance, an ice bath will immediately reduce swelling while flushing lactic acid out of the body. When you sit in an ice bath — or when you rub a cup of ice on the muscles you just trained, the cold causes your blood vessels to tighten. This helps drain the lactic acid out of your tired muscles.
Another reason for ice baths is to drain toxins out of the body, used as a “pulling” technique. Just like oil pulling, ice baths pull all the toxins out and away from the body. Cleansing the inside and helping the immune system strengthen and cleanse at the same time. There are many benefits to jumping into freezing temperatures such as:
- Lactic acid draining
- Tissue repair
- Eliminating toxins
- Injury prevention
- Immune support
- Healthy blood flow
- Reduce inflammation
When you get out of the bath, your muscle tissue warms back up, causing a return of oxygenated blood to help your muscles recover and repair. At Real Fitness, we did body weight exercises after getting out of the ice bath to warm our bodies back up and help with blood flow. The reason for this was to warm the body up quicker and get movement back into our cold limbs.
At Real Fitness Training we have held two ice baths in which participants have under gone breathing techniques before immersing themselves in the bath. Once in the bath they then practiced those breathing techniques that were instructed by our co-director Coach Mitch. Once 5mins were up everyone got out of the bath and then went through three sets of body weight exercises. The experience was very liberating and the benefits were immediate. For those who did the ice bath at the start of the year came back and did it again and new clients also joined in on the experience. We hold community events throughout the year and are a great way for everyone to see what we are all about at RFT. The ice bath was a huge success and we are looking forward to our next one.
Real Fitness Training is a boutique wellness studio located in the Hills District which includes the surrounding suburbs of Castle Hill, Baulkham Hills, Kellyville, Bella Vista, Castle Hill, Cherrybrook, Glenorie, West Pennant Hills, Glenwood and Rouse Hill. Our services include personal training, semi-private personal training, yoga, meditation and nutrition. Creating optimal lifestyles since 2013.
