Swimming
Ross Edgley's 7 tips for cold water acclimatisation
In the lead up to Red Bull Neptune Steps 2020, the Great British Swim hero offers some pointers on the best way to acclimatise to cold water.
If there’s anyone who knows what it takes to deal with cold water, it’s Ross Edgley – a man who spent 157 days swimming around mainland Britain in some exceptionally biting conditions.
Ahead of the return of Red Bull Neptune Steps in Glasgow on 23 March, the Great British Swim hero invited a few people down to a training session in London to help prepare for probably the trickiest aspect of the swim/rope-climb race: the cold.
Tom Wheatley, aka The Allrounder, went down to the icy cold waters of Parliament Hill Lido and joined the session led by Ross to see what pointers he could glean.
1. There is no substitute to cold water training
Ross Edgley during his session on cold water swimming
© Olaf Pignataro; Red Bull Content Pool
As swimming goes, I’ve never been particularly good at it. Even in a heated pool, I’m about as efficient at moving through the water as a battered hatchback. So when I learnt the roster for a training day with Ross included 25-meter lengths of an outdoor, unheated pool in February, things didn't look too good. But as Ross revealed, you can do constant gym workouts and have the perfect diet, but there’s no substitute for specificity training:
"When that cold water gets into your bones, there’s nowhere to hide. You just have to do the cold hard miles," Ross explains. "If you haven’t done the work beforehand you’ll get found out."
2. Practice begins at home
Don't worry - dipping your toe is just fine
© Olaf Pignataro; Red Bull Content Pool
For many, the idea of jumping in a cold lake and swimming a few miles can be a daunting thought. Thankfully, you can take it bit by bit, according to Ross: "Don’t feel like you have to go and swim in an ice lagoon. There are levels to it. It’s progressive overload." By that he means you build up your tolerance gradually.
Instead of jumping in a freezing cold lake, start by turning the shower cold for 30 seconds, then increase to a minute when you’re happy. From there, move onto a cold bath, then stick some ice in it. Once you’ve built up your tolerance to cold water, maybe then you can start looking at throwing yourself in a loch in Scotland.
3. Get comfortable with being uncomfortable
Participants poured buckets of ice water on one another
© Olaf Pignataro; Red Bull Content Pool
Everyone likes a tip. A cheat code to bypass the hard work and beat the game’s end of level baddie. Sadly, according to Ross, there aren’t any when it comes to cold water swimming. "You’ve just got to get in there," he imparted, "you’ve got to get comfortable with being uncomfortable". True to his word, Ross had buckets of ice chucked into our faces as we did tricep dips on the edge of the pool, which sharpened the sense and then some.
4. Get your breathing under control
Take a few minutes in the water to steady your breathing (and nerves)
© Olaf Pignataro; Red Bull Content Pool
For everyone at the event, the one common theme across the group, regardless of swimming ability, was the initial shock of getting in the water. To combat this we spent two minutes floating in the water and getting used to the cold. "Get your head under!" shouted Ross as he wandered past laughing, his excitement inversely proportional to that of everyone in the water.
That first shock of cold can cause the body to react by breathing more heavily or panicking. Getting used to the chilly temperature is essential – as swimming in a state of shock not only makes breathing harder, but you’ll be more likely to do things like gulp down water or burn up unnecessary energy. Take a few minutes to get used to the water and allow your breathing to return back to normal.
5. Understand what's happening to your body
"It may feel like you’re hyperthermic, but that’s just cold water shock"
© Olaf Pignataro; Red Bull Content Pool
According to Ross, the body likes homeostasis, that habitual level where it’s comfortable and everything is nice. Once you plunge yourself into freezing cold water then suddenly those innate self-preservation mechanisms that we all have inside of us just say: 'What are you doing? Get out!'
To deter these mechanisms Ross says the key is to educate yourself: "It may feel like you’re going hyperthermic, but that’s completely normal, it’s just cold water shock." Understand that the feeling of your hands going numb is simply the vasoconstriction of the capillaries, pulling away blood from your extremities around your hands and your feet and sending it to the vital organs. "It’s not bad, what you’re experiencing," assured Ross, "ultimately it’s just physiologically what happens. When you make peace with that it’s like, 'Oh okay, it’s good'".
6. It's in our DNA to deal with it
Swimming in a lido is an ideal way to prepare for an open water race
© Olaf Pignataro; Red Bull Content Pool
The idea of jumping into cold water and swimming may seem like madness to most people. The sort of thing that only supermen like Ross could do. But, as the man himself revealed , "Human biology has remained relatively unchanged for thousands of years, so when you look at our ancestors, they were just as hard as nails. They wouldn’t consider this an ice bath, they’d consider it a regular bath.
"Everything that you see people doing, we all have this primitive, powerful state that our ancestors used to have," added Ross. You may not be able to jump in a lake and swim 10k but your body is still designed to jump in a be able to handle it.
So, the next time you jump into a cold swimming pool, remember to get in touch with your primal self and ignore those modern-day alarm bells.
7. You’re not done when you get out
Open water races often have to manage their cold management between heats
© Olaf Pignataro; Red Bull Content Pool
Acclimatisation doesn’t just affect you when you’re in the water. Those changes to your body are still happening when you step out of it as well. "The real pros like surfers and outdoor swimmers will get out and they understand cold management," says Ross. "People don’t understand that even when you’ve got out, your body is still cooling."
For something like Red Bull Neptune Steps, where people may have to go in and out of the water three or more times, cold management is key to success, whether that’s stripping off and drying or opening up a hot flask of soup and heating the body from the inside out. The better you are at dealing with it, the more efficient your body is at returning to that state of happy homeostasis that we all like so much. Which is great for the rest of the day and also means the whole experience is viewed with less dread the next time you head out into open water.
