Optimize Performance & Life

| MY WIFE THINKS I'M CRAZY BUT IT WORKS

Upgrades to My Chest Freezer Ice Bath

by 6 Comments

Before I jump into the details, I recommend joining my Fire & Ice Contrast Therapy (Hot-Cold) facebook group.

Check out my ebook Exposure 101 Heat & Cold Guidebook

 

I’ve been enjoying my chest freezer cold plunge for a little over three years now. This article is a follow-up to my extremely popular article and video How to Build a Chest Freezer Ice Bath. It includes some upgrades I’ve made since setting up my cold plunge, some best practices I’ve learned and implemented, along with my current plunge routine and how to maximize the time spent in the cold.

UPGRADES

(more…)

How to Enhance the Benefits of Cold Thermogenesis

by 2 Comments

Baby, it’s cold outside…GOOD.

Before I get into the details, I recommend joining my Fire & Ice Contrast Therapy (Hot-Cold) facebook group.

There is an ancient Japanese practice called misogi that helps you reestablish a harmonious relationship with yourself and everything around you. The approach that is best known is through exposing the body to ice-cold water. A person typically immerses him or herself in a lake, waterfall or the sea. After performing misogi properly, you enter sumikiri – a state of pure clarity of body and mind. It is said that in this condition, your heart is as bright and clear as a cloudless sky, untainted by obstructive thoughts or worldly concerns.

Cold plunging is my misogi and I feel a sense of sumikiri every time I do it.

A Cold Thermogenesis Refresher

Cold water therapy — whether it’s a quick swim in an icy lake, a post-workout ice bath, or a brisk shower — can benefit your health in several ways.

Research has shown it can help you:

  • cut down on muscle soreness
  • cool down after a sweaty workout
  • get into a better mood (I know it does for me!)
  • aid your immune system
  • boost your metabolism and calorie burning
  • increase insulin sensitivity and help control blood glucose levels

It can even convert belly fat into metabolically active brown adipose tissue (BAT), which will increase your fat-burning capacity. More on this in a minute.

Some advocates say it can also decrease inflammation, improve your sleep and recovery, sharpen your mental focus and potentially fight certain types of disease as well as promote overall longevity. But more research needs to be done to determine if these benefits are supported by science.

[Read more…]

How an Additional Clearlight Sauna Full-Spectrum Heater Improved my Sauna Experience & Benefits

by 13 Comments

I love my Clearlight Sanctuary Y sauna (read/watch my full review here)! It’s one of the things I look forward to each day.

But as I mentioned in a previous article about hacking your sauna experience, I’m constantly looking for ways to maximize the time I spend doing something, including my sauna time. 

[Read more…]

Part 1 Recovery Series: A Blueprint for Coming Back from a Major Setback

by Leave a Comment

This series of articles will layout a complete blueprint on how I accelerated my recovery from a major setback. It’s something I wish I had access to as soon as I needed it. Instead, I spent many hours of research and self experimentation to put this together.

I hope it saves you time and accelerates your path to optimized health and performance.

2020….I was 41 years old and in the best shape of my life. I felt great, I set personal records in physical feats, exercised regularly and had a great routine to optimize my health and performance.

Coronavirus, a heated election, murder hornets, racial tension and now an extended hospital stay and surgery. When will you end 2020????

Then in July, I felt a weird sensation on my left side. It progressively turned to a pain so I saw my doctor. After a chest x-ray and a CT scan (which I almost declined because I am not a fan of being exposed to radiation but more on that in a little bit), I was diagnosed with pneumonia. I had no other symptoms other than the pain…no fever, shortness of breath, etc.

So I went on ten days of antibiotics (again, not a fan of killing off my good bacteria too), but I completed the round and felt better.

In fact, August and September I felt great. I even PRed a daily measure measurement I take — I do 10 minutes of breathing exercises, then completely exhale and do as many push-ups on the breath hold as possible.

57, my best ever! (BTW, as of January 2021, I am now up to 72)

Then, in early October, I started to feel a weird pain in my side. It progressively got worse and on October 24th, I woke at 5am, barely able to breathe so my wife rushed me to the ER. I saw two doctors leading up to this moment that had both reassured me the asymptomatic pneumonia I had in July had resolved and the pain I was feeling was due to scaring from the pneumonia.

[Read more…]

How to Properly Clean a Chest Freezer Cold Plunge, Step-by-Step

by 19 Comments

I discuss how I built my chest freezer ice plunge in a previous article and one of the most frequent questions I get is, “How do I keep it clean?”

Properly maintaining a chest freezer is really important to not only extend the life of your freezer but also to keep the water sanitized, especially if you’re dipping your head under.

To maintain clean water you have to make sure to filter and sanitize the water on a continuous basis.

  • Filtering removes debris. You can use an aquarium filter like the Marineland Magnum Filter and an Evob Skimmer net. I run the filter 24/7.
  • Sanitization kills bacteria. Sanitization methods includes adding hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and Epsom salt to the water and using an ozone generator. UPDATE: I have now added an ozone generator. More on that here.

Taking care of those two methods and showering prior to getting in (especially if you’re sweaty) is important for extending the life of the water.

But it’s also important to do a through cleaning on a reoccurring basis. I empty and clean my tank every 3-4 months.

Here’s what you’ll need and how to do it.

Continue reading

Find Your Topic of Interest

Recently Published