Cryotherapy – The Rising Star in Holistic Wellbeing
© Rainer Bolsinger
Most of us know about the workings and wonderings of a nice hot sauna. But have you ever considered to reverse this concept and to shiver in the cold instead of sweating in the hot?
icelab -110 °C has been in use in the medical field as well as in high-class sports for two decades, but it is just now finding its way into holistic health and wellness available to everybody, recognized 18th of June 2015 with the 2nd place obtaining 3 diamonds at the European Health & Spa Award in Vienna.
So what are we talking about here?
An icelab is the -110 °C cold sauna that you don’t enter with your towel leisurely wrapped around you. Instead you are professionally equipped with a bathing suit, gloves, headband, a mask and shoes with socks.
As soon as you enter the extreme dry cold will provoke a comfortable tickling sensation; that is initiated by conduction shifts on your skin. This way, your perception for the cold is rapidly changed – which should be highly appreciated.
Then the physical reaction hits, a nerve reaction that goes through the entire body (10 times faster than pain receptors in the nervous system). Your blood vessels rapidly narrow and expand after the treatment. Your body triggers a spill out of happy hormones, which should also be highly appreciated.
What are the benefits?
The icelab -110 °C therapy offers systematic and holistic treatments, which activate and equilibrate your entire body and mind. Even without a medical condition it works preventively and optimizes body functions.
Whole body cryotherapy has been in use since the 80ies. icelab -110 °C is used by leading sports institutions like the French national sports institute INSEP, Roland Garros, French Rugby Federation, FC Bayer Leverkusen 04, FC Porto, the German federal training facilities at Bundesleistungszentrum Kienbaum or the training facilities at the exclusive Nad al Sheba Club in Dubai.
There are three stages for training and completion related applications:
– Pre-cooling: applied to improve performance and power and to reduce pain perception and distress.
– Intermediate cooling: applied to optimize training. Reducing the risk to slide into overtraining.
– Post cooling: decreases negative effects of excessive efforts (helps to control pain and to manage stress); it aids faster recovery and enhances motivation.
But also we mere mortals can now benefit from the icelab -110 °C, which is growing in popularity rapidly and has been discovered as an upcoming trend by the spa scene. Because of the range of comprehensive applications, the icelab quiets the mind, recharges energy levels, reduces symptoms of jetlag, improves sleeping behavior, improves detoxification and gives an overall feeling of wellbeing.