Suns Invest In Cryochamber, Reap Muscle Recovery Benefits

Mar 18, 2012 11:47 AM EDT

The Suns purchased a $50,000 cryochamber on the advice of their renowned training staff.

"We use it for muscle recovery to pump the blood through the body," Suns head athletic trainer Aaron Nelson said. "We're trying to re-energize or reboot the body. It gives you a feeling of being cold and jump-starts your metabolism to feel refreshed the rest of the day."

The treatment consists of stepping into a nitrogen gas cylindrical chamber, followed by blasts of nitrogen gas starting out at minus-166 degrees and quickly cooling to between minus-256 and minus-274.

"I get in after a game," Grant Hill said. "It's helped me a lot on back-to-backs. I also get in there sometimes before games. It's definitely cutting edge and one of the new methods of recovery that I think, in five to 10 years, we'll see that lots of pro and college teams have it. I don't know exactly what it's doing to your body but I know when you get out, you just feel really good. I've tried it after games, mornings of back-to-backs before the second games and before games, and I get great results."

Exposure to extreme cold has similar effects to that of an ice bath.

"We're the carpenters," Nelson said. "It (the Cryosauna) is just another tool in our toolbox. There may be objective or subjective benefits. The psychological piece of that is better than anything. It's more important when I get feedback from players saying, 'I feel better when I do this.'

"I think a lot of teams will have something like this, and we just didn't want to fall behind."

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"The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of whole-body cryotherapy (WBC) on proprioceptive function, muscle force recovery following eccentric muscle contractions and tympanic temperature (TTY). Thirty-six subjects were randomly assigned to a group receiving two 3-min treatments of −110 ± 3 °C or 15 ± 3 °C. Knee joint position sense (JPS), maximal voluntary isometric contraction (MVIC) of the knee extensors, force proprioception and TTY were recorded before, immediately after the exposure and again 15 min later. A convenience sample of 18 subjects also underwent an eccentric exercise protocol on their contralateral left leg 24 h before exposure. MVIC (left knee), peak power output (PPO) during a repeated sprint on a cycle ergometer and muscles soreness were measured pre-, 24, 48 and 72 h post-treatment. WBC reduced TTY, by 0.3 °C, when compared with the control group (P<0.001). However, JPS, MVIC or force proprioception was not affected. Similarly, WBC did not effect MVIC, PPO or muscle soreness following eccentric exercise. WBC, administered 24 h after eccentric exercise, is ineffective in alleviating muscle soreness or enhancing muscle force recovery. The results of this study also indicate no increased risk of proprioceptive-related injury following WBC."

Costello, J.T., Algar, L.A., Donnelly, A.E. Effects of whole-body cryotherapy (-110 C) on proprioception and indices of muscle damage. Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports, ifirst.

aka the effects can not be shown but I bet it feels invigorating

I can't wait until some dumbo tries to compare eras (e.g. Dwight Howard to Russell) and I can dump this on them.

This is right up there with blood doping. Could you see putting an oxygen mask on a boxer or cage fighter between rounds? Stamina is supposed to be part of the competitive nature of sports. That's why boxing matches go 12 rounds and not 5. That's why basketball and football play 4 quarters and not 3 (they wouldn't be "quarters" then, but you know what I mean).

$50k is chump change. Time to go shopping Danny!

bob

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I must confess when I saw the headline by 112288 I first thought of Ted Williams.

beat

I THINK THEY ALL ARE A BUNCH OF STIFFS!

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