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Short Stuff: Hot Cold Plunge · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the short Stuff Josh, Chuck, Jerry,
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: not Dave, but Dave short stuff. Let's go.
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: That's right. We're talking about a the very hot trend.
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: It's been around for a long long time depending on
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: where you are in the world, but it's a very
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: hot trend of course among probably celebrity types and influencers.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: We're talking, of course about cold plunging and specifically the
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: sort of hot cold thing, either hot tub or sauna. Yeah,
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: I'm sorry, souna.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Is that just you that says that?
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: No, we got When we did our sauna episode, every
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: finished person in the world wrote in and said it's
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: pronounced sona.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Wow, great, nicely done. I'm gonna start saying sausage, sausage.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: I already say sausage. Yeah, you want to see how
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: the sausage is made?
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Do you? Are you part finned? No?
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: No, I wish I was, but I'm not.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Okay, So yeah, it does kind of make sense that
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: this would be like big in Finland because the Fins
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: were the ones who were credited with inventing the sauna. Sauna,
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: which supposedly in Thinn sauna means bath, essentially what you
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: would call bath and before the Fins had running hot
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: water that was handy everywhere. They used saunas to basically
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: bathe rather than having to just go out in the
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: snow and bathe.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess like a dry bath, a hot dry.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: Bath exactly that you make yourself wet in.
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: That's right, exactly, You're you're you're lathering up with your
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: own liquids. That sounds really gross. If you go to
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: like the Finished Tourism Board website or something, you might
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: see them also say something like this when you come
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: out of the sauna, jump into a lake, or roll
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: in the snow.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: Because they all sound like Freud.
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: Apparently they do. If you do roll in the snow,
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: make sure it is fresh and powdery. Old icy snow
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: can have an effect on your skin like sandpaper that chuck.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: One of that voice is one of your Halloween episode voices.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: I recognize it from some Yeah.
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: So what they're talking about, though, is this hot to
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: cold thing which is leaving a sauna and jumping right
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: into some cold water or in their case a lot
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: of times, snow.
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, which is awesome. It can be really great, But
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: just like any trend or thing that everybody's behind, it's
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: worth taking an extra look to see if it may
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: or may not be actually beneficial, could even be harmful.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: And it turns out there is a lot of evidence
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: on each saunas and cold therapy, cold plunges, that kind
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: of thing that say, yeah, these actually do have some
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: pretty good beneficial effects, but both of them also pose risks,
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: and there's not a lot of actual research on combining them,
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: which is purposefully shocking your body temperature wise, that's the
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: point of that hot cold thing. We're not exactly sure
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: if it's a good thing for you.
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think we all know that like
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: a sauna or something like that, getting a good sweat
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: in can be good for you. There's a lot of
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: benefits to sweating. You're regulating your body temperature, you're activating
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: your cardiovascular system. It kind of can mimic exercise, even
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: cardiovascular exercise. We also know that it can help detoxify you.
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: And we also know that cold stuff has benefits and
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: it's a great anti inflammatory. And athletes have long you know,
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: sat in like ice baths and stuff after like the
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: big game or something like that, not specifically the Super Bowl,
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: any big game, not Capital T H E. Big game. Sure,
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: But these two things separately we already know and it's
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: kind of proven that they both have a lot of
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: great benefits. But there are people that say, well, when
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: you combine them together, you can reap even more benefits.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and what the benefits arise from, ostensibly is called
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: the hormetic effect or hormetic stress, which is technically a
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: good kind of stress. It's the kind of stress you
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: put on your body when you're exercising, and in doing
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: so by kind of pushing your body beyond its normal
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: homeostatic you know, status quo. Yeah, you're actually you're training
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: it to better respond to stresses that you don't intentionally
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: put on it, like just being stressed in general. And
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  Speaker 1: so supposedly, according to this idea, the hormetic effect, which
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: seems to be pretty legitimate, by just kind of slowly,
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: little by little stressing your body, you improve your body's stress,
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: respond to your immune system, that kind of thing, and
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: exercise is one way to do it. But also exposing
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: it to temperature extremes like through a sauna or a
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: cold plunge also produces hormetic effects because they put hormatic
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: stress on your body too. That seems to be the
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: basis behind health benefits from sauna in or cold plunging.
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know people will tell you that it
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: really also can help you mentally. It can I could
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: be an invigorating experience and people, you know, there is
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: a little bit of research that says that people have
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: shown to like improve their mood and stuff like that.
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: So you know, there are a lot of people that
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: say a lot of things about all the benefits what
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: you haven't seen a whole lot of and I guess
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: we'll discuss this after the break. Is like, all right, well,
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: then show me the large scale, randomized controlled studies with
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: large data pools of people from all kinds of age groups.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: I guess not randomized, but just large, you know, a
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: variety of people doing this thing. And then like, then
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: we can actually talk science. So we'll get to that
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: right after this. All right, So go anywhere online to
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: any influencer blog and they tell you how amazing this
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: is for you. A lot of websites will say this
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: is wonderful and you should all do it. But then
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: when you start digging a little deeper and you're like, well,
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: let me see if there's any studies about this. It
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: turns out they're trying to do it now and we're
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: only just now, like the research or these articles that
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: I kind of picked from, we're from just a couple
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: of months ago, like late in twenty twenty three, where
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: they're just now starting to say, like, hey, we need
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: to get a thousand people, not you know, twenty healthy
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: young men, you know, twenty healthy young finishmen who are like,
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: this feels great. Need to really because you know, some
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: of this stuff is plausible, these doctors are saying, but
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: we really need to dig in on it because it
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: also could probably be dangerous.
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah, because I mean it seems like what the whole
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: idea is predicated on is that we do have, you know,
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: like substantial research showing that there are health benefits from
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: the sauna, like it lowers blood pressure and improves cardiovascular health,
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: and that there's demonstrable benefits from cold plunges, like it's
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: an anti inflammatory, like you said, it can improve mood. Apparently,
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: a technique for breaking a panic attack when you're in
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: the midst of it is to sink your face into
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: a bowl of ice water for about ten seconds, and
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: it produces what's called the diving reflex, and it releases
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: dopamine and orapinephrin in enough amounts that it can actually
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: derail or short circuit of panic attack. So there is
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: like actual legitimate benefits to each one, like you're saying,
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: though it's them combined that the jury is still out
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: on right.
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: I wonder if Huey Lewis was having a panic attack
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: when he plunged his face in ice water and the
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: I Want a New Drug video.
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: He wasn't after that, I'll tell you that much.
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: Not to make light of panic attacks, of course, I
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: was just kind of making light of Huey Lewis and
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: his news. Well we had someone right in actually, because
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: we've been flipped with that term. That's like, if you've
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: ever suffered a panic attack, you probably wouldn't just say, oh,
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: almost had a panic attack.
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: Sure that doesn't sound say what that doesn't sound like us?
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: Oh it was us. So depending on who you talk to,
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: there are doctors that say this actually can be very dangerous.
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: The National Center for Cold Weather Safety website says, you
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: know you can. This is something called a cold shock response,
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: where you have such a rapid increase in breathing and
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: heart rate and blood pressure that if you're not in
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: great cardiac health, this could possibly kill you, Like you
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: could have cardiac arrest right there on the spot.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's nuts, which makes sense because I mean it
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: feels like you could, like when you jump into a
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: cold plunge, especially if you're already really hot, but supposedly
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: in less than a minute, you could die in water
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: that's sixty degrees parreheight or lower. And there's other things
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: that can happen too, if you jump all the way in,
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: Like a lot of cold plunges don't involve your head,
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: which is way way worse than just jumping in or harder,
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: I should say, more difficult. But if you do jump
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: in all at once, the shock of the cold could
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: be enough that you involuntarily gasp, and if you're underwater,
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: that's not good for your lungs.
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And you know, the first time I kind of
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: reconsider this because I had done this kind of thing.
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: I've done some and it wasn't like, oh, let's do
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: a cold plunge. Like literally in high school in the eighties,
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: we would like jump into the icy lake at this
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: sort of youth group camp. So that wasn't being tripped.
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: It was just the fun thing to do. Gotcha, It's
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: like a polar plunge. But I was with my good
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: friend Adam Pranica of the Greatest Generation over not too
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: long ago, and I was moving to do this. It
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: was Hey, we're in the hot tub, let's jump in
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: this cold pool and he said you better watch out, bro.
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: Adam say, bro, and what do you mean? He went, well,
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: I'm just getting ready because you could have a cardiac arrest.
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: I was like what, and you yeah, it's something that
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: can happen. And all of a sudden, I was nervous
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: because you know, I'm not in you know, like headed
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: toward the emergency room anytime soon. But I have a
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: cardiac score that gives me a little bit of pause
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: when it comes to thinking about something like this. Sure,
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: so I was like, well, geez, I'm not in high
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: school anymore. Maybe I should think about this. And I
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: jumped out of the hot tub and I dove into
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: the pool head first. And it was great and it
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: was awesome and it was fun and I didn't have
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: a cardiac arrest. But it did make me think twice.
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: And each time I moved to do this, from now on,
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: I will think twice.
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: I have to say I was really surprised by that
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: twist at the end there that you actually want to
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: jump in. Yeah. I was to be like, no, I'm
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: not doing that anymore.
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: No, And you know what what I gathered, And of
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: course we need the real research and the real data
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: to know this, but from what I gathered from the warnings,
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: it was like, there's probably a middle ground between like
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: being a healthy twenty two year old finish person and
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: having like being in really really poor cardiac health. And
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: I'm somewhere in the middle there, and you should not
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: do it if you're like in really really bad cardiac.
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: Health, not even really really bad. If you're being treated
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: for any kind of cardiac condition, you probably shouldn't cold plunge,
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: especially not after a sauna too. At the very least,
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: talk to your doctor about it. Don't listen to it,
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: don't don't take our advice.
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: Please.
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: But not only is the whether you have a heart
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: condition or not a differentiator temperature. It's a differentiat too.
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: You'll see people who are like, yeah, jump into water
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: that's like fifty seven degrees farentheight. That is astoundingly cold.
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: That's the water temperature that killed the survivors of the
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: Titanic going down like that's North Sea in February. Cold
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: water temperature, right, you can get the same effect from
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: much warmer yeh water, I mean I'm talking like seventy
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: degrees still sounds warm. That's not warm, especially if you're
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: in like a hot tub first, or a sauna first,
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: or you've exercised or something like that. It does the trick.
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: It does everything you need to do without or I
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: shouldn't say without the chance of killing you, with a
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: much less chance of killing you.
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, I've even seen that you can take
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: a very hot shower and then turn it to cold.
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's nice to see that.
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: And that's even enough to sort of give you some benefit.
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: Even worse chuck is not taking the hot shower first,
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: just getting into a cold shower immediately turning the water on.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: It's it's rough, but if you can train yourself to
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: do it, it's very rewarding.
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I did that for a summer in Athens when
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: I didn't feel like turning the gas on.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: Man, and you were like ripped from it. I'll bet
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: I was.
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: More ripped than I was now. And of course it
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: was Athens in the summer, so it was hot. So
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: it wasn't quite as bad as you might imagine for.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: Sure, So I guess we should probably just wrap up
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: one more time. This can be dangerous. You should probably
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: do a little more research on it, especially if you
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: have a questionable heart or your heart's questionably healthy. Just
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: use your head, use your noodle first. Don't just listen
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: to what people on TikTok tell you. Listen to what
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: people on podcasts tell you.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and maybe even a pool noodle in case you
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: lose consciousness.
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: Its smart. That means short stuff is out.
• 13:51
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• 13:54
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