Sports star ice baths questioned

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Paula Radcliffe may say they are the secret of her success, but Australian research is questioning the benefits of taking an ice bath after exercise.

Physiotherapists recommend the bath as a way to speed up recovery, claiming the icy cold helps shift lactic acid. :rolleyes:

But this is unproven, and a study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine now claims the opposite may be true.

Out of 40 volunteers, those who took an icy plunge reported more pain after 24 hours than those who took a tepid bath.

Tepid response

Ice baths have become one of the most fashionable ways of recovering after an intense game or marathon. From rugby to tennis players, the bath has a series of celebrity endorsers.

The theory is that the icy cold causes the blood vessels to tighten, and drains the blood along with waste products such as lactic acid out of the legs.

When Jonny Wilkinson or Paula Radcliffe emerge from the bath, their limbs fill up with fresh blood which invigorates the muscles with oxygen and helps the cells repair.

Although physiotherapists who promote the bath have had little evidence to prove this, there is plenty of anecdotal evidence from the athletes themselves that the bath makes them feel better.

In line with this theory, the study carried out at the University of Melbourne had expected to find a 25% reduction in pain after 48 hours among those who had the ice immersion.

Instead it found that there was no difference in physical pain measurements such as swelling or tenderness, and in fact those who had been in the ice reported more pain when going from a sitting to a standing position after 24 hours than those who had the tepid treatment.

“This study challenges the use of ice-water immersion in athletes,” wrote the researchers.

“Ice-water immersion offers no benefit for pain, swelling, isometric strength and function, and in fact may make more athletes sore the next day.”

It was unclear why the ice may had this effect, and the researchers said further study was needed.

John Brewer, Director of the Lucozade Sports Science Academy ( :wink: ), said he did not find it surprising that there was no difference between the two samples.

“I don’t find it hard to believe that the ice doesn’t have any long-term benefit, although I would question whether the ice group really did feel more pain after 24 hours than the tepid group. The problem with pain is that it is subjective and very hard to measure,” he said.

“And because it’s subjective, there may even be a placebo effect on those who take the cold bath. It’s part of their ritual, it finishes off the endurance test, and many clearly report that it makes them feel better.”

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6287210.stm

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Depends how long you’re in the ice bath- too long might be an issue- AND, more to the point, how efficient your circulatory system is. This may explain why top athletes get better results than lab-rats who get two dollars an hour.

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Exactly, details are missing at the moment and I am looking for the actual paper. Charlie, do you mean the circulatory system, as this develops via training to a better network (i.e., capillaries)? Thanks!

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That’s right, fitter athletes, better circulation, better response.

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i really dont care how it works,
but 50 degrees for 12-15 minutes does wonders for me.

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I won’t comment at all on ice baths. But check this out.

http://thelongestlistofthelongeststuffatthelongestdomainnameatlonglast.com/long278.html

Picture of the guy…

http://pictopia.com/perl/gal?provider_id=352&photo_name=ptl%3Aafp%3Axt-mt-afp-orig_name_SGE.HQG00.280507170340.photo00

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And then there is the effect on the nervous system …

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Would this have any effect on the duration of ice baths for fitter athletes (e.g., shorter due to better circulation)?

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from the conclusion/discussion in ‘Water immersion: does it enhance recovery from exercise?’ . wilcock et al, 2006 International Journal of sports physiology and Performance.

‘10- to 20-minute water immersion is unlikely to be detrimental to athletic
recovery. In some studies the use of water immersion postexercise maintained
strength and jump ability but not cycling or running performance. The magnitude
of these observed performance changes might be a result of the exercise protocol
rather than the performance measure in the studies. Athletes who underwent intense
exercise sessions that caused prolonged muscle fatigue (muscle damage) benefi ted
from water immersion. In addition, benefits were observed with athletes who, over
a number of days, performed multiple bouts of strength and plyometric exercise
and water-recovery sessions. The beneficial effects of water immersion from a
single-repeat, short-duration exercise were found to be trivial to small, or about the
same as the mean variance. Reduced muscle edema caused by hydrostatic pressure
during water immersion might be the mechanism that could provide the observed
benefit to performance recovery.’

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So instead of an ice bath, we could just take a bath (according to this)?

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There are studies completed with comparisons with thermonuetral water also.

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I would say yes.

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What is the temperature of the bath? Does this not have an impact on the results?

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I never really considered ice baths to aid in removing lactic acid myself. Sure, you get the whole vasoconstriction-vasodilation thing but i would of thought that would have only a small benefit as it’s only one cycle. Contrast baths are probably more effective for this.

I always used ice baths following high intensity sessions to reduce swelling. The report above says swelling was not reduced but i can’t see what protocols they used for the baths. I went with 10-20min immersions to reduce swelling but the purpose of this as i saw it was to make any future ‘flush n feed’ stimulus (be it tempo, massage, contrast baths, sauna etc…) more effective, this being where the nutrients would be enriched in the muscles leading to recovery. The ‘flush n feeds’ had the prerequisite of the muscles being recovered enough so that the stimulus would not cause unwanted swelling (which would hamper recovery) and the ice baths went towards achieving this, along with time obviously!

Alan.

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If you look at the papers the biggest factor is the time for the cold to penetrate so skin fold or fat is a major factor here, the effect is on the NS moreseo than the vascular system directly

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Correct reference:
Ice-water immersion and delayed-onset muscle soreness: a randomised controlled trial
Br. J. Sports Med., Jun 2007; 41: 392 - 397.

From the abstract at the website http://bjsm.bmj.com (full article only for subscribers):

Objective: To determine if ice-water immersion after eccentric quadriceps exercise minimises the symptoms of delayed-onset muscle soreness (DOMS).

Design: A prospective randomised double-blind controlled trial was undertaken. 40 untrained volunteers performed an eccentric loading protocol with their non-dominant leg.

Interventions: Participants were randomised to three 1-min immersions in either ice water (5±1°C) or tepid water (24°C).

Main outcome measures: Pain and tenderness (visual analogue scale), swelling (thigh circumference), function (one-legged hop for distance), maximal isometric strength and serum creatine kinase (CK) recorded at baseline, 24, 48 and 72 h after exercise. Changes in outcome measures over time were compared to determine the effect of group allocation using independent t tests or Mann–Whitney U tests.

Results: No significant differences were observed between groups with regard to changes in most pain parameters, tenderness, isometric strength, swelling, hop-for-distance or serum CK over time. There was a significant difference in pain on sit-to-stand at 24 h, with the intervention group demonstrating a greater increase in pain than the control group (median change 8.0 vs 2.0 mm, respectively, p = 0.009).

Conclusions: The protocol of ice-water immersion used in this study was ineffectual in minimising markers of DOMS in untrained individuals. This study challenges the wide use of this intervention as a recovery strategy by athletes.

(Seems a rather unusual regimen to me; very short, very cold)

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Just had some kind of discussion with my physio… he doesn’t like ‘cold’…
He thinks only warmth can deliver more blood flow.

It can be described from a physics-view… :
viscosity get lower as temperature increases, this means that if you use a warmth source to heaten up your muscles, the blood will flow better.

Ice, on the contrary, will cool your blood and slow it down.
This may be the point where it all stucks; do we have to think that, due to this ‘slower’ blood flow in our muscles, the heart is wanting to increase the blood flow, and when we remove the ice, things will flow much faster ?
After all, i think the sum of this will be zero.

My physio must got things right, i am willing to believe him and in the future i am going to try it…i’ll let you know…

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So results on UNTRAINED volunteers tells us what to do with top athletes. And you wonder why coaches just shrug their shoulders when this stuff shows up!
New study… College courses were ineffective in changing the job prospects of chimpanzees, so college is wasted on students.

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I’ve looked at all the research and there have been NO proper studies conducted on the appplication of or use of cryotherapy in sport.

There are some things that can be drawn and interpreted frim the studies but no study as properly assessed the use.

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Maybe we can find work for all the unemployed Chimps to run studies! In the meantime, if you feel it’s working, it probably is.