The guy who came in from the cold

Cold-water therapy may not be so good for us after all, says Bryan Hubbard

Yes, reader, I’m a moral coward. I know I should be plunging into cold-water therapy with a happy heart, but somehow I just can’t.

Turn the shower to freezing for 30 seconds at the end? Not so likely.

Sit in an ice bath for 10 minutes? Do me a favor.

Dive into a freezing ocean on Christmas Day (or any day, come to that)? Leave it out.

And there’s no escape. I was talking at a health conference last autumn, and who should turn up but Wim Hof’s identical twin brother, Andre? He even decided to sit next to me the first evening for dinner because I looked “interesting”—i.e., morally compromised.

For those who don’t know, Wim Hof is a maniac. Google him, and you’ll see photographs of him sitting naked in the snow, laughing! Hof’s motto is “I’m not afraid of dying, just not living,” which I’ve spent hours trying to unravel.

He pioneered the ice-cold bath therapy, and Andre has been cut from the same frozen cloth. He’s embraced his brother’s asceticism with the zeal of someone who was hit with a hailstone on the road to Damascus.

Andre also has no fear of the cold, as Google tells us, and throughout the conference, he set up ice baths for anyone who wanted a masochistic start to the day at 6:00 a.m. I was in bed at the time, dreaming of my first cup of coffee topped off with warm milk. At breakfast, the already-iced gave me a frosty reception as I slouched into the dining hall, slopping coffee on the pristine floor while inching toward the scrambled eggs.

“Had your ice bath this morning?” said one enthusiast, virtue glowing from every pore, knowing full well I hadn’t.

Andre tried a more management-consultancy approach. “Give it a go. After the first nine minutes, you hardly notice the cold,” he enthused. Maths isn’t my strong suit, but I think that equates to suffering pain and agony for 90 percent of the time before luxuriating in less pain for the final 10 percent.

Ah, but it’s good for you! You live longer, your immune system is stronger and you have reduced inflammation levels. Or you could die earlier and warm.

The ice lovers not only hold the highest peaks of virtue but could also be right. And, take it from me, even a moral coward has a conscience: I know I should take the ice plunge, but I just can’t.

Well, that was true until just the other day, when a new piece of research landed on my desk, wafted in as if by a warm zephyr from the Azores. The study was entitled “Effects of Cold-Water Immersion on Health and Wellbeing: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.” It could just as easily have been called “Bryan, You Stay in That Warm, Cozy Bed, Because There’s Nothing Crueler Than Pointless Suffering.”

My warm-hearted saviors were researchers from the University of South Australia who analyzed data from 11 studies that had analyzed the collective sufferings of 3,177 participants. And, yes, on the face of it, cold-water therapy lowered stress, improved sleep quality and boosted overall quality of life.¹

Hubbard 0, Cold Plungers 1? Hold your horses. Lead researcher Tara Cain (damehood—canonization, even?) noted the good effects lasted for just 12 hours. Twelve bloody hours after suffering excruciating agony for 10 minutes? And those who regularly switched their shower heat setting to “unbelievably freezing” for up to 90 seconds every day saw some benefits, but these faded after three months.

“While there have been many claims that cold-water immersion experiences can boost your mood and immunity, we found very little evidence to support these claims,” she added from her nice, warm clinic.

Worse, cold-water immersion increases inflammation. That’s a surprise and even counterintuitive, as athletes regularly take an ice bath to reduce muscle soreness and inflammation after a workout. “The immediate spike in inflammation is the body’s reaction to the cold as a stressor,” added Ben Singh, the Blessed Cain’s colleague.

This sudden inflammatory stress to the body makes cold-water therapy a nonstarter for anyone with a preexisting health condition, the researchers add. As my preexisting condition is to stay in a warm bed for a few more minutes, I think I’ll give the therapy a cold shoulder.

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