SUBMERGING yourself in icy cold water has been hailed as a fast route to recovery for athletes. But in a report on the website mysportscience.com, Shona Halson, head of recovery at the Australian Institute of Sport, stresses the approach is not for everyone and won’t necessarily enhance your ability to train more effectively.
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Ice bath: some find that recovery slows after an icy dip
Halson says science now suggests that “performing too much recovery may decrease the stimulus for adaptation” and that one school of thought now suggests ice baths might “decrease inflammation and soreness and therefore lessen the trigger for adapting to the training the athlete has just completed”.