If you’ve ever been tempted to buy an ice bath or take part in a “polar plunge,” you may want to check out this study first—at least if you’re into weight training. A dip into frigid waters “looks like it’s not a great idea” if your main focus is your muscles, Maastricht University’s Milan Betz, lead author of a new study on the matter, tells the Washington Post.
- For the admittedly small study recently published in the Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise journal, researchers had 12 healthy young men take part in a rigorous session of leg presses and leg extension exercises before being made to use a bike-like device in which one of their legs was submerged in a container of 80-degree water, while the other was placed in a container of freezing 30-degree water.
