The benefits of a cold shower or bath have been discussed for a long time. In fact, the idea of having cold showers or cold baths has been used back thousands of years ago. In the past, people were having cold showers simply because heating water was far more difficult than it is nowadays. Since most of us have the ability to take a steaming hot bath or shower, lots of people simply never have a cold shower. However, they are missing various benefits. Today, we’re going to share the benefits of a cold shower specifically for bodybuilding, but there could be others.
Maybe you already heard about elite athletes and pro bodybuilders taking a cold shower or bath. But why? Do they actually support their bodybuilding goals?
In this article, you’re going to get your answers. We are going to share the reasons why taking a cold shower every once in a while would benefit your goal for muscle growth and fitness.
A cold shower can boost your metabolism
You may have heard about the rumor that taking a cold shower can boost your metabolism. Well, that’s more than just a rumor, that’s actually true. Moreover, you may already know the importance of your metabolic rate in terms of burning fat and being lean. Therefore, we can say that a cold shower helps you (indirectly) burn fat. By boosting your metabolism, your body is burning fat at a faster rate. The reason is very simple – the body tries to keep your body warm (via the process known as thermogenesis) by burning fat.
During the cold shower (or bath), the body tries hard to maintain temperature homeostasis (a self-regulating process to maintain temperature stability). To do so, it burns fat at a significant rate. According to studies, submersion in 14 Celsius (57 Fahrenheit) water would increase your metabolic rate by a whopping 350%! Not only that but a cold shower or bath could stimulate the brown adipose tissues (BAT) – brown fat. It is that type of fat that is essential for converting fat into heat, the one you actually need to burn excess fat.
As a great bonus, it doesn’t only boost metabolism, but it also boosts your immune system. The immune system is the organs and processes of the body that provide resistance to infection and toxins. In short, by having a better immune system (as a result of taking a cold shower), you are less likely to be sick. This can indirectly support your bodybuilding goals by making you less likely to be sick and unable to work out.
The cold shower may boost your testosterone levels
By now you already know that testosterone plays a crucial role in your ability to build muscle and burn fat. It is very simple – men with higher testosterone levels are responding much better to workouts, and growing more muscle. They also tend to burn fat more easily. The good news is that research suggests there’s a connection between a cold shower (or cold bath) and high testosterone levels. That study indicates that testes work best in cold temperatures.
Moreover, a cold shower (or bath) has the ability to significantly reduce cortisol (the stress hormone). Well, it actually increases the cortisol during submersion, but it helps decrease it after a cold shower.
High cortisol negatively impacts your testosterone production. By reducing cortisol, you may help boost your testosterone levels. Furthermore, reducing cortisol is also highly efficient at engaging the parasympathetic nervous system. That’s important to support a decent night’s sleep. Then again, quality sleep is extremely important to boost testosterone levels and support muscle growth. So, this can also indirectly help you grow muscle by helping you sleep better.
Great way to start your day
One strange thing about a cold shower is that it can help you both sleep better and wake up too. It is obvious that you shouldn’t have a cold shower or bath right before going to sleep, as it may interfere with it (as said, during submersion in cold water, your cortisol tends to increase, which hinders your sleep). But you can have a cold shower throughout the day (or 1-2 hours before going to sleep) and this will help reduce cortisol, helping you sleep. But it is also an extremely helpful way to start the day by having a cold shower in the morning. Especially considering that lots of us are struggling to get going in the morning, feeling groggy. However, a cold shower is exactly what you need to wake up your body and mind.
This temporary spike in cortisol will wake you up and you’re going to feel ready and refreshed for the day. Moreover, it will also stimulate the release of antidepressant endorphins. This means that you are going to have a better mood during the day. Additionally, it will boost the blood flow, which means that it will spike your heart rate and metabolism (as said earlier) which activates your nervous system, for better focus and overall mental abilities.
The best part? You’re unlikely to have a 20 minute cold shower. Instead, a quick cold shower of up to 5 minutes in the morning will significantly help benefit your mind and body. You’ll feel energized, fresh, in a good mood, and ready to start the day (and clean too).
What Else Should You Do?
It is important to understand that a cold shower (or bath) does come with a lot of benefits, however, it does not do the job of a diet and workout. This basically means that a cold shower may benefit your training and dieting efforts. To achieve your goals, you need to make sure you work out hard and regularly, while you eat balanced and healthy. Only with the help of a workout, you ensure you continue growing muscle and support fat burning. By eating well with a balanced diet, you ensure to avoid developing nutrient deficiencies that impact your muscle’s ability to recover or perform in the gym. This is the only way to achieve your goals. Then, the cold shower helps it up. But there are other things that could help support your bodybuilding efforts.
- Stay hydrated. Do not drink the bare minimum amount of water. Water is crucial to support the repair and recovery of your muscles!
- Try supplements. Creatine and protein have been widely studied, with a lot of studies proving them highly efficient at improving muscular strength, reducing muscle inflammation, and others. There are numerous other bodybuilding supplements that you may try out.
- Get plenty of rest. As said, a cold shower helps you sleep better, and that’s important to grow muscle and burn fat. You need to ensure that your body gets enough rest and sleep. Sleep is important to stay healthy and it is the time when your muscles are growing.
- Try anabolic steroids or other PEDs. The best compounds in the world for growing muscles are anabolic steroids. There’s literally nothing better. When you try to break through a plateau or speed up your muscle building process – they can greatly help. Just make sure you buy quality ones from reputable online sources.
Ready To Maximize Your Results?
There are numerous ways in which you can boost your workouts and dieting efforts. Giving up on bad habits such as drinking or smoking can help muscle growth. Adding a cold shower every once in a while can help muscle growth. In the end, it is important to learn about it all to make sure that you maximize your efforts in the gym and dieting so you can get the results you’ve been dreaming of.
However, we understand that sometimes, regardless of how hard you may seem to try, you just don’t seem to get there. Or at least, the process is utterly slow. As said earlier, anabolic steroids are the best possible things you can get to support your gains. However, we know that they may be harder to find (at least, quality ones), and we know that a lot of you may be afraid of their side effects (due to all the bad rep they got in the media in the late decades).
Well, Supps-For-Life.to has the solution. We won’t only provide you with the best quality steroids on the market, with a very large inventory for you to choose from, but we offer them for the best prices (so you could save money) and provide individual cycle advice so you would make sure you get the right ones and use them correctly. This way, you ensure the best results while minimizing the possible side effects!
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