When it comes to your health and fitness, chances are, your primary focus has been on your nutritional protocol as well as how often and how much you are exercising throughout the day.
Both of those are critical elements to helping kick-start your progress.
That said, sometimes it’s helpful to look outside the realm of these two factors and think about other lifestyle changes that you may benefit from. One such lifestyle change to consider is cold showers.
Perhaps you’ve heard of other people, namely high-level athletes taking cold showers before. What do you stand to gain from incorporating this into your day?
Let’s look at three key benefits that cold showers have to offer.
3 Benefits of Cold Showers
1. Improved alertness
One thing most people find hard to do is get up in the morning. If you’re someone who hits the snooze button two times before finally crawling out of bed, you know that getting into that hot shower is enough to make you want to fall asleep all over again.
Try a cold shower instead.
It’s a great way to wake your body and brain up and prepare for the day. Even if it’s halfway through the day, you can use the cold shower to instantly shock your body and increase alertness and concentration.
While you may not be able to hop in the shower halfway through your workday, if you ever plan to pull a late night or are going in for a workout in the evening, a cold shower prior to doing these things may help.
2. Improved circulation
Another great benefit that cold showers have to offer is that they will boost circulation throughout the body as well. The cold shower will help blood flow increase to the muscle tissues, which can improve recovery and boost your lean muscle mass building potential.
Remember that how quickly you build muscle comes down to how well you deliver amino acids to the muscle fibers, so anything that increases this can help. Enhanced circulation is definitely one of those things.
The improved circulation may also offer heart health benefits as well and could help to lower your blood pressure and even help clear blocked arteries.
3. Decreased muscle soreness
Finally, if you’ve just performed a very intense workout, a cold shower may be just the thing you need to avoid waking up the next morning feeling that telltale sign of a good workout: severe muscle soreness.
By taking a cold shower after the workout is over, you’ll lower the level of inflammation present in the muscle tissues, which can contribute to the soreness.
So don’t overlook the benefits of a cold shower. While not that pleasant to take, they can do your body a world of good.
If you just can’t stand the thought of a cold shower, consider contrasting showers instead, alternating hot water with cold. This can offer many of the same benefits and not be so hard to take.
