Thinking of taking the plunge? Try these cold water therapy tubs

"I was training for my first marathon, and five weeks into training I got a stress fracture," Sarah says. "I couldn't run for seven weeks, so I really only had four weeks to train on my feet. I controlled everything that I could to encourage healing, so I used oxygen chambers, and I ate lots of different anti-inflammatory foods.

It's important to use cold therapy for healing rather than heat, so that the swelling around the bone can reduce, so I used an ice bath three to four times a week, and I still use it regularly now."

Sarah explains her step-by-step process: "My cold therapy tub has always got water in it, and I change it about every three weeks - it's very easy to clean. I add ice to make it cold, and you can buy it from the shops or fill up Tupperware containers and stick them in the freezer.

It's got a thermometer in it, so when you want to get in, take the lid off and check the temperature. I wear either my pants and bra or a bikini. You want to stay in for a minute per degree and no longer so for example, if the water is three degrees it's three minutes, six degrees, six minutes.

When you get in, it takes your breath away, so you inhale first then as you submerge, exhale. It can feel sharp, but that very quickly subsides as your body gets used to it. When you get out, your body will be red because the blood has rushed to the surface. I pop on a dressing gown or a dry robe, then go and take a shower. Just make sure your shower isn't too hot."

Physical recovery: Many athletes take an ice bath after training. It can change how fluids like blood and lymph flow through your body. In this process, your vessels constrict due to the cold and open up after you get out and warm up. Scientific evidence suggests that cold water therapy helps the metabolic waste from your body. All the while, this gets oxygen and nutrients to your muscles. Additionally, ice baths lower inflammation after intense physical exercise, helping with recovery.

Weight loss: Another potential benefit of ice baths is that they could lead to weight loss, as cold temperatures stimulate the activation of brown fat tissue throughout your body. The brown fat encourages your body to produce heat as it burns off white fat. If you are on a weight loss journey, taking regular ice baths prevents the accumulation of excess body weight.

Increased parasympathetic activity: As mentioned above, exposing your body to icy temperatures on a regular basis is known to make you more resilient to stress, anxiety and depression. The cold stimulates the vagus nerve, which leads to an increase in parasympathetic activity. This has amazing effects on many conditions, such as anxiety, depression, and gut and digestion problems.

According to Dr A. Brion Gardner, an orthopaedic surgeon with The Centers for Advanced Orthopaedics for Healthline, taking a cold plunge can help ease the soreness, burning and aching in your muscles after training sessions. When you expose your body to the cold, it causes the blood vessels to constrict. This reduces inflammation, swelling or other reactions in the body.

Cold water therapy tubs can offer potential mental health benefits. "It's so invigorating for the mind," Sarah says. "It really helps mental clarity and it's such a good feeling. It gives you a buzz. Sometimes I close my eyes and focus on my breath, other times I'll put on some really upbeat music as it makes me feel really strong."

According to the Dutch motivational speaker and extreme athlete Wim Hof (aka The Iceman), our skin is never exposed to the natural elements. However, he believes we are built to be stimulated. As there are thermal receptors on the surface of our skin, being exposed to cold water gives us an electrical jolt to the deepest part of our brain.

The cold stimulates our vagus nerve, a part of our parasympathetic nervous system. This controls many crucial bodily functions such as mood, immune response, digestion, and heart rate. When the vagus nerve is activated, it taps into our parasympathetic mode. Then, our breathing and heart rate slow and allows our body to remain in a state of calm.

Sarah sums it up as follows: "It allows your body to heal. It reduces pain and inflammation, it increases alertness and reduces muscle soreness."

Temperature: The first step is to make sure you have the right temperature. The water should be between 10-15°C. If using a blow-up or fold-down tub mentioned above, you should get some bags of ice and use a thermometer to check the temperature.

How to position yourself: Position your body so that you can fully submerge into the ice bath. Ideally, you want to get your entire body up to your neck submerged in the water in order to reap the full benefits of blood vessel constriction.

Time: The best time to take an ice bath is directly after a workout, but you can use it at any time. After about an hour or so, many of the inflammatory, physiological responses would have already started or finished by this time.

Breathing: Perhaps the most important aspect of taking an ice bath is breathing. It is a central part of the Wim Hof Method, and when he coaches people to breathe properly, he states that “to oxygenate the body, you must keep calm and endure the shock of the cold water.”

While it's not quite the same experience as submerging yourself in icy water, you can still get some of the effects by taking a cold shower. While cold showers were often talked about before, it was Wim Hof, aka the Iceman, who really started the cold shower movement.

Some benefits of cold showers include reduced stress, higher levels of alertness, more robust immune response, increased willpower, and weight loss. Immersing yourself in icy water “brings balance to the hormonal system,” he states in a video tutorial on his website, where you can take online courses in the Wim Hof Method.

Wim Hof advises gradually building up the duration and intensity of your cold shower. If you have no prior experience with cold showers, start with a regular shower and finish the last 30 seconds cold. You quickly notice that you are able to tolerate the cold more over time.