Exercising is an integral part of a healthy lifestyle, and often comes with muscle soreness, fatigue and the need for effective recovery strategies. While many people focus on post-workout practices like stretching or icing, incorporating a sauna session into your after-exercise routine can provide numerous benefits. Let’s explore how saunas can help enhance your workout experience and optimize your fitness goals.

How Using a Sauna Can Compliment Your Workout Routine

When you exercise, you work your muscles harder than they’re accustomed to, causing microscopic tears, which in turn causes inflammation, and over time muscle growth and improved strength as your body recovers. Stepping into a sauna is like entering a physiological furnace where temperatures soar between 150°F and 195°F (65°C – 90°C), and like exercising, also triggers a symphony of changes within your body. Beyond the buzzwords, research is starting to paint a compelling picture that using a sauna in conjunction with a workout could be a heatwave into healing. 

• Muscle Soreness Slayer: Studies show that sauna use after intense workouts can significantly reduce muscle soreness. The heat activates your body’s natural pain-relieving hormones, turning down the volume on those aching muscles. 
• Recovery Rocket Fuel: Saunas may accelerate your body’s ability to repair damaged muscle tissue, getting you back in the gym faster. 
• Endurance Enhancer: Some studies suggest that regular sauna use might improve your ability to sustain longer workouts over time. 
• Sleep Sanctuary: The post-sauna relaxation can lead to deeper, more restful sleep, crucial for muscle repair and overall recovery. 

Exercising causes stress to your muscles, and it’s through proper post-workout nutrition and rest that those fibers grow back bigger and stronger. As your body temperature rises from sitting in a hot sauna, your muscles begin to relax. This relaxation relieves immediate post-workout muscle tightness, which helps alleviate soreness. Spending time enveloped in heat is also relaxing and can help you sleep better. Sleep is an important factor, if you don’t get quality sleep, you won’t fully recover from your training and ultimately won’t fully benefit from it. 

Working out can be physically demanding and mentally taxing. Sitting in a sauna provides a tranquil and peaceful environment that promotes relaxation and stress reduction. Chronic stress has been connected to a whole host of negative physical, emotional and psychological symptoms, so this mental relaxation can help enhance your overall well-being, promote better sleep, and even contribute to your motivation for future workouts.

Sauna Before or After Exercising? 

While saunas are not a replacement for traditional cardiovascular exercises, they do offer some benefits for heart health. Sitting in a sauna increases your heart rate and mimics a mild cardiovascular workout, so regular sauna use can improve your cardiovascular conditioning over time, making your heart more efficient at pumping blood and increasing your overall endurance. 

Heat therapy has been associated with health and wellness for thousands of years. Long before barbells, treadmills and gyms came onto the scene, ancient peoples were soothing their muscles in sweat lodges and other sauna precursors. Today, we have access to different kinds of saunas and can even enjoy them in the comfort of our homes. 

There are three main types of saunas:

• Dry sauna: heat is created either by burning wood or by using an electric heater. While traditional saunas typically have dry air and high temperatures, many people throw water on the hot rocks to create steam.
• Steam sauna: as the name suggests, steam saunas (better known as steam rooms) rely on steam from boiling water for heat which creates a humid environment.
• Infrared sauna: infrared light instead of a heating element is used in this type. Infrared heat penetrates deeper into the skin and neuromuscular system than warmed air, so people tend to sweat more at lower temperatures than they might in a traditional sauna.

Regardless of the type of sauna, you might think it would make sense to sit in it before you get hot and sweaty from your workout, however that’s not the case. The heat of the sauna will relax and loosen your muscles, which can put you at greater risk of pulling or tearing them during a workout. Additionally, you’ll be more dehydrated and at a greater risk of overheating. You’ll also feel more tired, which isn’t a great way to start your workout. Instead, save the sauna for after your workout and consider it a reward for all the hard work you just completed. 

Some believe that spending time in a sauna can help you lose weight and detoxify your body. The thought is that copious sweating will release toxins from your body, including heavy metals, alcohol and nicotine. The truth is that while sweating does play a small role in helping to remove contaminants, the real detoxifiers in your body are your liver, kidneys and lungs. Profuse sweating is however great for your skin, in addition to all the other benefits we’ve mentioned.

Are you ready to embrace the power of heat therapy and unlock its potential to enhance your workout experience and optimize your fitness goals? Give us a call at 970-879-4390 or contact us to learn more.