Ultimate Cold Plunge Challenge with Gary Brecka | The Ultimate Human | Day 1

Okay.

To use bathtub or other things just.

So they don't feel like kind of ostracized. Okay. And then. So 10:15 mention that the live component.

Yeah. Okay. Okay.

We're live here. They can hear me. All right, guys, I'm gonna give a couple minutes to let people kind of scroll in. I, I mean, I've been excited for a lot of challenges, but I think I'm most excited for this challenge because two things that I do every single day are breath work and cold plunging. I try to get natural light. I do try to touch the surface of the earth, but sometimes it's just not practical. Cold plunging, of all things, is about to become your drug of choice. If you've never done a cold plunge before, you're in for a real treat. I, I wanted to be really clear about something. You do not have to buy the plunge pop up. You don't have to go out and spend thousands of dollars on a cold plunge. If you have a cold shower or if you have a bathtub and you can get to 711 and just get a couple bags of ice and put them in your tub, it usually takes me four to eight of those 10 pound bags or, or three or four of the 20 pound bags of ice. You could just dump those in your tub and fill it up with cool water, swirl it around, and let all of the ice melt first. Don't get in there with all of the ice right at the top. It's okay if there's still some ice on the top, but you want it to swirl around so the temperature is kind of even and that ice has had a chance to cool the tub down. But by no means do you have to spend any money to participate in today's cold plunge challenge. In fact, I'm going to be giving away a bunch of cold plunge pop ups. I'm going to be giving away a bunch of ultimate human swag gear. We're finally fully stocked on ultimate human swagger. Maybe if you're lucky, you'll get one of these. The nice. The ultimate human sandals. So we're going to, we're going to, we're going to make these really exciting. And I want to reward you guys for just breaking the mold and, and doing something really difficult. You know, one of, one of my favorite sayings that I say all the time is that aging is the aggressive pursuit of comfort. And nothing is more true than that statement. You know, the, the more aggressively we seek comfort, the faster we age. And so cold plunging allows you to get up in the morning, do something difficult, survive it, conquer it, have that dopamine rush, and then go out and start your day. And I think it's a real metaphor for life because in, in the human body there is a response called hormesis. And hormesis is, is the scientific term for when you stress the body. You put either your cells or your body under stress and it strengthens in response. You know, not all stress is bad for the body. Some stresses are very good for the body. So this is what we call a hormetic stress. We're going to put a stress on the body and it's going to react by strengthening. The same thing that we do during resistance exercise. Right. I mean, the whole reason we go to the gym is to actually tear muscle, is to damage muscle. And what happens when you tear a muscle? Well, it grows back larger. This is called muscle hypertrophy or muscle hyperplasia. Muscle hypertrophy is when you tear a muscle and it grows back larger. And muscle hyperplasia is when you, is where you tear a muscle, it grows back larger and then new, excuse me, new tissue forms around that tear. And that's what really makes our muscles much larger and much stronger. So cold plunging is something that we do not to become cold adaptive. We do it to cold shock the body. Right. We're trying to shock the body, have it respond, and then get out. So, you know, if you're on Instagram long enough, you're going to see guys getting in cold plunges at 35 degrees, 37 degrees for 10 or 12 minutes. There is no evidence that I have seen anywhere in the literature that colder is better or, or longer is better. So let's just go through the basics of cold plunging really quick. And then we're going to get, in about 10 minutes, we're going to switch over to Ryan at Cold Plunge headquarters. He's going to show us a couple of the different plunges. He's going to be doing the plunge with us today. Remember, at 10:55, we're going to switch over and we're going to actually, I'm going to switch cameras and we're going to actually do the, the cold plunge together. And then when we're done, our first cold plunge, we'll take a few minute break, about a 15 minute break. So you can dry off and, and change and put some dry clothes on. And then we'll switch over to the VIP and I'll open it up for an hour of direct Q and A and a bunch of, and a bunch of giveaways so basically, what is cold plunging? Well, cold plunging is a hormetic stress, right? Just like exercise or even eating, it is a hormetic stress. And when we hormetically stress the body, very often it strengthens in response. The main proven benefits of cold plunging are the following. We know that when we submerse ourselves in cold water that the first thing that happens, you get a peripheral vasoconstriction. So remember that your arteries are actually smooth muscle. There's three types of muscle in the body. You've got cardiac muscle, which is only in the heart. You've got smooth muscle, which is lining the arteries throughout 63,000 miles of vessel in our body. And then you've got skeletal muscle, the muscle that we see that, that, you know, our biceps and our, our deltoids and our pecs. So what happens when you submerge smooth muscle in cold water? Is it vasospasms? So that's going to take all the blood from your extremities, your arms, your legs, your toes, your hands, your forearms, and it's going to push that blood into your core in an effort to save your life. And what happens when you focus all of that blood in your core? Well, that blood's going to your brain, your liver, your lungs, your pancreas, your kidneys, all the vital organs. It's incredible how intelligent God designed us, because when it's, it's so many protective mechanisms, we can tap these every day. So now you get this peripheral vasoconstriction. You force blood into your core, which means that you are forcing blood up to your brain. You're actually mimicking deep sleep, or REM sleep. With the amount of oxygen you're pushing to your brain, you're taking the blood that would normally be out in your extremities and you're forcing it into the core. The next thing that happens is, is your body activates a very special type of fat in the body. We all know what white fat is because most of us have some that we'd love to get rid of. So white fat is the little bit of belly fat. You know, it's the fat that you can actually see. It's, it's the, you know, the fat that's actually very visible. But there's a different type of fat in the body called brown fat. And brown fat is very special because brown fat is a human being's thermostat. It actually takes a calorie and exchanges it for heat. So when people say that cold plunging is not good for weight loss or that there's no evidence that cold plunging can help you lose body fat. That is absolutely false. There are a number of benefits that point directly to fatty acid metabolism and directly to weight loss. So now you've got this peripheral vasoconstriction, you've activated brown fat. And there is a cost. When you cool the body down and then you sit, you get out of a cold plunge and you sit, how does your body warm back up? It not only warms up the ambient air temperature because it's, it's probably maybe 80 degrees outside here in Miami. Some of you are in 70 degree weather. How does your body go past 70 degrees, past 80 degrees and get all the way back to 98.6 degrees? It's brown fat. Brown fat is exchanging calories for heat. We're actually generating heat by exchanging calories for heat. So it is absolutely raising your metabolism and, and it is absolutely good for fatty acid metabolism. So we have, in our 10x health clinic network, if you, if you saw my post the other day, we just passed our 150,000th patient. So we have 150,000 patients in our system. And I don't, I don't like to say that we, we use our clients and our patients as guinea pigs, but we, we do large scale experiments, meaning we do large scale participations. And the, and the ones that, that do cold plunging in the morning consistently report better body fat percentages, lower body fat percentages. And thousands of patients have told us that cold plunging was the thing, the game changer that took them from that plateau where they couldn't lose any more body fat to actually kick starting their, their body fat loss again. So first thing, you get a peripheral vasoconstriction, then you activate brown fat, the body's thermostat. It starts to raise your, your temperature. There's a cost to creating heat and that cost is calories. So you're burning calories and raising your metabolic rate. The other thing that happens is this hormetic response is really interesting because if you put your face under the water, what happens is you activate something called the mammalian dive reflex. And if you look up the mammalian dive reflex, you'll see that all mammals, including human beings, have this reflex. And, and what happens when a whale or dolphin dives in the ocean? As they actually go deeper, the water gets colder. That cold water passing over their face causes their body to shift from a sympathetic state to a parasympathetic state. A sympathetic state is a state of fight or flight. A parasympathetic state is a state of rest and digest. When we're sleeping, we're parasympathetic when we're working, or we're agitated, or we're having an argument, or we're fearful, or we're in a sympathetic state. So believe it or not, if you get into cold plunge and you put your head just for a few seconds underwater and that cold water rushes by your face, you'll activate this mammalian dive reflex. It will actually calm your nervous system down. Think about, you know, a whale or a dolphin wanting to dive to great depths. As they're going deeper, they're obviously getting further from the surface. So you want to use less oxygen and you want the nervous system to be calm. You want the heart rate to be slow. You want the metabolism to quiet so that you can hold your breath for longer. So you're going to activate the mammalian dive reflex. If you put cold water over your face, you've activated brown fat, you've gotten a peripheral vasoconstriction, and then the real magic happens. Your liver releases something called cold shock proteins. If you want to really have some fun, just Google benefits of cold shock proteins. Don't take my word for it. There's all kinds of research on cold shock proteins. There are two that I'm specifically researching now myself. One is called LIN, LIN28A, and the other one is called LIN, LIN28B. What's interesting about these two cold shock proteins, and there's a whole class of these proteins. Remember, your body is panicking, right? Your body thinks that you were walking on a lake on the ice and you broke through the ice and now you're in ice cold water. And so how am I going to get out? Well, number one, I'm going to calm the body down. Number two, I'm going to peripheral vasoconstrict. Number three, I'm going to turn on my body's thermostat. Number four, I'm going to release cold shock proteins. These proteins hit the bloodstream. They are known to scour the body of free radicals. So they're a free radical neutralizer. So they stop free radical oxidation. They, they actually increase the rate of protein synthesis, which is muscle repair. And LIN28A and LIN28B, these two very special cold shock proteins are now being heavily researched because they actually improve your insulin resistance. So if you're slightly insulin resistant, meaning that it takes more insulin to bring your blood sugar down, these cold shock proteins can actually help your body become more Sensitive to glucose, meaning you become more insulin sensitive and less insulin resistant. We know now that insulin resistance is one of the hallmarks of chronic disease. Right? The whole. The old theory that cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, is the cause of cardiovascular disease or that it is directly linked to cardiovascular disease is being blown out of the water by big data and new research. We know that what happens in many forms of cardiovascular disease is, is that it's the cholesterol being called to the site, not cholesterol just showing up on its own and causing the damage. It's like blaming the firemen for the fire. Right? Because the old hypothesis was, well, every time there's a fire, the firemen show up. And what are the firemen there to do? They're there to put out the fire. So every time there's endothelial damage, meaning damage to the lining of your blood vessels, what's called the endocalyx or the glycocalyx, when there's damage, they call cholesterol. And cholesterol comes to patch that site of repair. So what we want to avoid is pro inflammatory foods, things like seed oils and all. I don't want to get off the topic on our cold plunge challenge. But the things that cause damage to our endothelial lining. So it's not the firemen. You know, the school of thought should not be, if we had less firemen, we would have less fires. That's not true. So if we have less cholesterol, we don't have less cardiovascular disease. If we have less cholesterol, we have less capacity to repair the damage that causes cardiovascular disease. And so one of the interesting things about cold plunging, the reason why I'm telling you guys the story, is that one of the interesting things about cold plunging is that these cold shock proteins that are released from your liver can actually help reduce that damage, lower the inflammatory response, and increase your insulin resistance. And then the final thing it does, think about what kind of mood or what kind of state you want to be in if you truly did fall through the ice. All right, if you actually crack through the ice and you only had a few minutes to get out, well, you would want to be clear, cognizant, awake and alert. You'd want, you'd want a pupillary dilation. You'd want to be hyper aware of your surroundings. So what happens? You, you get a spike in dopamine. That's an endorphin rush. And this doesn't just last for 30 seconds, right? I mean, I saw a comparison between the amount of dopamine raise that you get from, from doing cocaine, and I don't suggest that you do cocaine instead of cold plunging. My preference is cold plunging, but that, that lasts about nine to 20 minutes. And the rise in dopamine from cold plunging can last up to six hours. That's a fact. So just think about it. You get an elevated mood. You get a boost in your emotional state. You get an increase in your metabolism. You get cold shock proteins dumped into the body. You get a peripheral vasoconstriction, you activate brown fat. You start exchanging calories for heat. So now you're actually burning fat to try to return your body temperature to normal. You're in an amazing mood when you get out. So I, I, I just think it's one of those things that every one of us has access to. If you've got a cold shower, if you got a bathtub, you can, you can cold plunge. I was excited because Plunge built this, you know, 120, you know, cold plunge for us for this challenge. But by no means do you have to order one of those to, to participate. So the exciting thing about cold plunging is you can do it just about anywhere. You know, it's really funny. I mean, some of the hotels that I frequent, like, every time I go to New York, I go to the Peninsula in New York. And, and now when I, when I check in, there's a little note in my system that they bring up a big cooler full of ice and they dump it into the hotel's tub there. And sometimes I'm there for three or four days, and the water stays cold the entire time. So I just want to congratulate you guys on taking the step to join this gold Plunge challenge. This is amazing. I want to welcome Ryan. Is he, is he on yet? Ryan, what's up? Awesome. Yeah, Ryan is the founder of Plunge, guys. He's the reason for the season right now. Are you a Cold Plunge headquarters? I am headquarters.

Good morning. I'm, yeah, I'm here in the gym getting geared up for the, for the Plunge. But yeah, man, you're excited to be with your community. We've been looking forward to this.

Yeah, I've been looking forward this too. Guys, if you really want to see one of my favorite podcasts, look up the podcast that I did with Ryan. Ryan and I did a podcast. We go deep down the rabbit hole on cold plunging. I even flew out to their facility. I was at absolutely overwhelmed. I mean, they have more than a hundred thousand square feet of manufacturing out there for these, for these different plunges. So take it away, man. Walk us through some of the benefits of coal plunging. I would love it if we could actually see your. Your place. Are you on an iPhone?

I'm on my iPhone here, yes. We'll. I'll go out in a second. We'll take a little tour of the factory, see them all being built and everything. Yeah, man. I mean, you, you summed it up so well of everything that goes into cold plunging, all the different benefits. The thing that I, I mean, not a scientist, I don't play one on podcasts.

I'm a scientist and I play them.

On a podcast a lot. Yeah, well, I mean, just the ultimate, like, everyone being here your first time or whether you've done hundreds of these. It's just the beautiful part is, no matter where you're at, it works every single time by getting in cold water. Whether you get in for 30 seconds, 60 seconds, three minutes, you're going to see the benefits to it. And so that's, you know, that's, that's, that's why we do this. This is, this is the first time we've ever done it with this big group of humans. So I'm really excited. There's nothing better. I cold plunge every single morning, and most of them are by myself, and they're awesome. But there's nothing better than when you're doing it with a. A bunch of different people and you're seeing the smile, seeing the struggle that everyone's kind of going through in that first 30 seconds. And that's. It's a good note for everyone. When you get in today, like, you're going to go first. 30 to 45 seconds are going to be challenging. And that's, that's what you want. You want that signal of your breath kind of being taken away. Kind of lose your breath for a second. That's a great, That's a good. It's a good signal to the body. And you just focus in on that breath. And after that, 30, 45 seconds, a little different for everyone. You'll start to feel yourself kind of calm, regulate, and that's the signal that you really want. Because everyone always asks, like, how long do you go for? What's a. What's a good time for plunging? And, you know, I, I'm less on the minutes and more on the signals to the body. And like I said, it's. You get in, you want to lose your breath, kind of get. Get that shock that Gary was talking about, and then you. There's a point where you kind of feel your whole system regulate and you'll feel your breath elongate a little bit more. And I always say you want to be able to choose to get out of the cold water as opposed to the water forcing you out. And you'll hit these different thresholds throughout the time while you're plunging. So really listen into the body of, you know, that might be a minute for you, that might be 45 seconds, but feel yourself like, okay, I have regulated. I'm, I'm in a little bit more control of being. As opposed to being forced out of the water. And I think cold plunge is one of the most. It's the, it's the thing that I found the most. We cannot create artificial environments that stress us out. You know, we go through life every single day, and when someone cuts us off in the road, that's a stressful moment. But that wasn't. We couldn't have made that up. We can't make someone, you know, walk into a room and say, hey, scare me. We. You can't make that up. Cold plunging is the only thing that you can actually intentionally step into and go, okay, this is going to really stress me out, but I'm going to be able to regulate. So I think that's the, you know, a real intention for today is knowing like, okay, I'm going to do something hard. We're gonna do something hard. We're gonna do it together. But we're all super capable of doing this. The body is resilient. The body can adapt to this, and we're gonna do it together and we'll have a lot of fun.

Yeah, this is awesome. You know, I, I think it's a metaphor for life. You know, almost like yoga. You know, it, it, it teaches you to be calm in a, in a state and an environment of stress. And, you know, if you've done three minutes in cold water in the morning or more in cold water in the morning, and then you get a little nasty, nasty gram on Instagram or your boss kind of upsets you or your spouse says something off color, your kids are particularly irritating that morning. It just seems like nothing. You're like, this is nothing, man. I've already been in, you know, 50 degree water for three minutes and I feel great. And I find that it's a real metaphor for life is learning to maintain that sense of calm while your body is actually under stress. Because if you get into that cold water up to your, your neck, and your first reaction is not, I want to get the hell out of here. Then you're not doing it right. So, you know, I, I don't think I've ever, I mean, I've gotten in a cold plunge, not in the best mood, but I've never gotten out of a cold plunge, not in an amazing mood. I'm actually in an amazing mood right now because I got in a cold plunge right before this started. So I did a cold plunge right before our, our plunge challenge. Hey, this Dylan Pylon, he said, so excited to have my 30 grams of protein this morning. Half teaspoon of Celtic salt, my bone broth, my hydrogen bottle is producing its second cycle. I've done my morning breath work. This will be my first cold plunge ever. I'm super excited and motivated from doing it all together. That is amazing.

That's the morning routine right there, Dylan.

Yeah. So you know what, you know what I want to do, Ryan? I'm going to send. Hey, Dylan. Dylan Pylon, if you're, if you're listening, I'm sending you a pop up plunge. Unless you already have one. So if you'll just text your. We got your first and last name, but text us your address. We're going to get you out of a plunge pop up for free. I love that you're, you're, you're doing that for your morning routine. I want to reward you guys for that. I'm going to be giving away a bunch of swag gear and stuff today too. But Dylan just got our first free pop up plunge. So Ryan, are you in the, are you in the room that has the, the two plunges? Yeah.

Oh, there it is.

This is my favorite room.

He's got a sauna and we got the plunges here, so got our plunges. So our team's always getting in the cold water, whether on breaks, after work, before work.

He's not lying, dude. I've been, I've been to their headquarters and they, they rotate through there and they actually get in, get in a plunge. I mean, what, what an awesome reward for your, your employees. Everybody gets along after they get out.

Of the cold plunge. Fun fact. We do all of our final interviews in the sauna and cold plunge. That's great.

I feel like there's an HR violation in there somewhere.

But it's worked out so far. And then we have a program for all of our team that cold plunges, they get, you know, bonuses and whatnot. So it's just something, it's a win win. We get everyone plunging. Everyone's in a Better mood, everyone's healthier. And so, yeah, I'm here in our facility. We have a couple of our different. These are all in units. We have a bunch of different ones, whether from the pop up all the way up to these units here. But yeah, this is where I'm going to be plunging today, taking the plunge with all you guys. But I, we walk on out here, Right out here is. We go out, we have our big factory out here and all the different.

Yeah, look at this place, guys. That is a serious operation.

Yeah, we just go. It's just a bolt. Cold plunge. Cold plunge.

Wow.

We have all the, our chillers here for different product types to do all the testing here, all the production, all the assembly. So if you're ever out in the west coast here in Sacramento, California, hit us up, come in, get a cold plunge with us. Come see where they're built, come see where they're. We ship them out, test them and everything.

So I, I, I, you know, I've been there and show them the QC area, the quality control area, because these, these plunges are manufactured and then they, once they're done, they go to this special area and there's a series of quality controls. They fill them with water, they circulate it and test the motors.

Yeah, let's see. Yes, we have all of our different water beds. So every unit gets, we recycle all the water here. All the water gets put through and then it's almost like, you know, you guys know the movie the Matrix? It almost looks like that. We just have dozens and dozens of units here all being tested. So they get tested, obviously, check any leaks, make sure they're cooling at the right speed. All the team. Here's a checklist right here. So the team gets it and they go through. But yeah, it's a really fun spot. It's kind of the final spot before they get approved and then sent out the shipping. But yeah, team, this team takes a lot of pride into the units that come through here and, you know, end up in people's homes across the, across the world. Yeah.

And I think it's worth pointing out, guys, I mean, Ryan, this is a labor of love for Ryan and his partner. I mean, they, they actually both started in the float tank business. They had, they had float tank spas and, and then Covid hit and they, they sort of reimagined things and they, they, they started this small little company called plunge and they've innovated themselves over and over again. I mean, the thing that was really especially Impactful for me was the amount of response they take to customer feedback. So customers didn't like, you know, the position of the motor, they didn't like the sound the motor would make. They didn't like the depth of the plunge, they didn't like the width of the plunge, they didn't like the angle of the, of the tub. And they took all of this customer feedback and they just kept innovating and innovating. This tub, I mean, the one that I get in is called the Plunge xl. By no means am I telling you guys you have to have one of these fancy plunges, but, but the one I have is the Plunge xl. This thing is whisper quiet. I change the water every four or five months. It stays crystal clear. It's got a beautiful light in it. You can recline in the back. But when I went to the factory, I was, I was just awestruck by the, the amount of pride and passion that goes into the work that they do. I don't just think it's the best plunge. I think it's the most reliable plunge. I think it has the quietest motor. I think it's the best bang for the buck. You know, dollar wise. So you can actually see the size of that operation is, is, is unbelievable. When was your first cold plunge, Ryan?

My first cold plunge was like my first intentional cold plunge was back around 2015.

Intentional cold plunge.

You did some unintentionally water, you know, gotten in a river and felt the benefits. But like, actually like, okay, I'm gonna do this cold plunge thing that this crazy guy named Wim Hof is telling the world about. You know, he changed my life. He introduced me to, you know, the power of cold water. And right around 2015, I, I did it. And it was, you know, life change. Yeah. This company didn't start from, you know, we were, we were practitioners well before this thing ever came about. And you know, as Mike and I, we started it in the garage and really grateful to, you know, I never would have thought I'd be here with a group like you guys, you know, doing a cold plunge challenge with thousands of people. But it's, I pinch myself.

It's pretty cool. Yeah. You know, you know what's really cool is, you know, here in Miami, there's, you know, these guys are part of a, a revolution of sort of resetting the Miami day party. And you know, they, they have these events where, you know, people gather and they cold plunge and they, and they have coffee and they, they get together with the DJ And I've been to a couple of these and there are 400 plus people there. And what was really cool to me was that you, you walk into this setting and they're in great hotels, they're on rooftops, they're in really cool pop up places around the city. I'm in downtown Miami. And what's really cool is you have this beautiful crowd, you know, relatively young crowd, and instead of being gathered around, you know, partying and alcohol, they're gathered around cold, plunging and coffee and exchanging ideas and networking and it's a really cool environment. And if you walked into this party, you would think it was any other Miami beach day party. There's a dj, the only thing that's absent is drugs and alcohol and the nighttime, it's, it's know they have them in the mornings. And it's so cool to see that there's this, this undercurrent of bio optimization and longevity and anti aging and optimal health. It's sort of becoming the in thing. You know, maybe people are drinking a lot less, they're being a lot more health conscious. And it was really cool to see so many people in their, you know, 20s and, and early 30s all getting together in a really safe environment and bathing suits and getting into cold plunges and having coffee and then networking together. And it was, it was a, it was a cool icebreaker because instead of going to a networking event where everybody's kind of dressed up and wearing their fancy watches and their nice shoes and the women are all carrying great purses, it's hard to tell the socioeconomic difference between people when they're in board shorts and bikinis. And so everybody's kind of on the same plane. And the, the energy there was amazing, the exchange of ideas was amazing. I met so many young entrepreneurs that were doing super cool things in the bitcoin space and the tech tech space and, and in the marketing space and in the social media space and, and I just think that, that this pandemic in a lot of ways did us, did us a big favor, woke us up to the importance of our own state of health, that we actually have to become citizen scientists ourself and modern medicine is not going to do it for us. We've got to take, you know, optimal health into our own hands. And so one of the ways that we do that is we learn interesting ways to hormetically stress the body and strengthen it. So, so I promise you, the next time you show up at the office at 9 o' clock in the morning, if you were in a cold plunge at 7am that morning, it's going to be your highest performing day of your career. And so it's just really cool to see people embracing these other ways of getting that stimulus of being clean and clear and cognizant and awake. If you haven't gotten out of a cold plunge yet and felt that dopamine, that sustained dopamine rise, you're in for a real treat. I'm really, really excited to do this. These, these guys also. Can you, can you just walk us in and show us the, the saunas? This is wild too, because the room that he's in, there's another room just as big where they're actually making, where they're making saunas. And sometimes I talk about contrast therapy. You know, those of you that participated in my sleep challenge, one of the biggest bumps in sleep scores that we had was doing some contrast therapy. Sauna, cold plunge or really, really warm shower followed by a really, really cold shower and then getting in. Look at this. So tell us what's going on here, Ryan.

It's pretty noisy in here with all the, all the guns going off and all the pressure tanks and everything. But here we have a QC approved sauna ready to go out right here. Our xl. Yes. We build it all from clear cedar from the ground up. We do the full manufacturing here in Sacramento, California. Yeah, and this has been a, this was another product that we launched just out of kind of the. You guys, the customer. A lot of our customers had the cold plunge and they were like, would you guys ever build a sauna? And so we took it on, spent about two years designing it. And this is the, this is the final state here. So have all the saunas going out. We have two different types of a third type launching later this year.

But do you have one that's fully assembled?

Yeah. I don't know if you guys can hear me. It's.

I can hear you. Do you have one that's fully assembled?

We have actually this morning. They're all crated up.

It's really cool. It's just got a pitched roof and it's, you know, it's narrow at the base and wider at the back. It's a really, it's a really cool one.

Yeah.

Okay. So Jacqueline Nicholson says, I've been doing the grounding, morning sun and a cold plunge two to three times per day since April. I'm 57 and I feel better than I have most of my adult life. I'm a leukemia survivor from 2017. That is amazing. Jaclyn, I am going to send you some swag gear, some ultimate human swag. So if you just connect with my team in the chat, I'm going to send you some female workout gear. I'm going to send you an ultimate human trucker. And if we have her size, I'll even send you some of my ultimate human. The hottest selling item on Amazon sold out around the world collector series, limited edition ultimate human flip flop. So you're getting a whole. You're getting a whole swag pack, Jaclyn. Thank you for sharing that with us. Ryan. It's so awesome, man. So many people are like coming in and telling me how cold punching has changed their life. Jenny Martinez is asking, please talk about how to resist that initial urge to jump out. I can't seem to overcome it. You want to take that one, Ryan?

Yeah. So I would encourage. That's totally normal first. That's the. That's the response we want. So it's all. There's. It starts with the mindset like, okay, and also if it is too cold and you can't stay in, raise the temperature up a bit. You know, a lot of, you know, it's 60 degrees below and you're first starting out, just go there, you know, get an easy thermometer, fill it up with a little warm water. More warm water if you need to.

Yeah.

I would just say if you cannot stay in and get through that first, I would say really focus 10 breaths, raise the temperature up a bit. And when you're doing it, you really. My. What I really like to focus on is my exhale being twice as long as my inhale.

Great, great point. Yeah. And exhale through a straw.

System up.

Yeah, exhale through a straw. You know, one of, one of the things that I do is I'll. And I'll show you guys today when we actually do the. The actual cold plunge itself. When, when Ryan and I and the rest of you guys get in the cold punch here in a few minutes is I actually, right before I step in, I do four obnoxiously deep breaths.

I.

On the fourth breath, I go, I breathe in as much as I can and I step into the cold plunge and I go and I exhale and I sit all the way down to my neck. And what I find is by focusing on my breath, I'm not as focused on that overwhelming shock from the water. So I'll breathe out, you know, an inhale three times obnoxiously. Then on the fourth inhale, I step into the cold plunge and I sit all the way down to my neck. But Ryan brings up a really good point. Again, I haven't seen any research that colder is better or longer is better. Technically, a cold plunge is anything below 58 degrees Fahrenheit. So you can start at 58 or 60 degrees Fahrenheit, work your way down to between 50 and 55 degrees and stay there. That's fine. Remember, we're not trying to become cold adaptive. We are trying to cold shock the body. We don't want to become an Eskimo. Right. We don't want the body to begin to start to adapt to cold. That's why most cold. Plus I recommend three minutes minimum, six minutes maximum. Right. Three to five minutes is perfect. Six minutes maximum and get out. You've gotten all the benefits. You've released all the dopamine, you spiked all the endorphins, you've had a maximum vasoconstrictant constriction. You've had the maximum activation of brown fat. The cold shock proteins have been released from your liver. So by staying in there longer and really starting to shiver and potentially lower your core body temperature, there's not a lot of benefits to that. Shaktarati, get all five of those benefits and then get out. Then you can slowly work your way down to lower temperatures. Don't you know, look at some of these folks on Instagram that are getting in 35, 37 degree water and going underwater with a snorkel. I actually think that that's quite dangerous. You know, remember I talk about this all the time. Your brain is only this far inside the surface of your skull. It is not good to freeze it, it is not good to bake it. So not too cold for too long. But I think that focusing on your breath is. It is a great thing. And, and then try to at least get to 30 seconds. And then your next time, try to get to a minute. And then I think once you make it to a minute, you're there.

Yeah. The big thing, I always, I liken pole plunging to a workout routine. So, you know, we're building up resiliency in our immune system, strengthening our nervous system. Those are two areas we're working on. But we also have to look at it when we're starting this journey. Those might not strong. So it's similar to if you haven't worked out in five years time, I'm not going to go put you through a CrossFit workout. In fact, that would probably be a negative to your body and could hurt you. So you want to treat the cold water too. It's like your first workout back. It's like, hey, let's just sweat. Let's, let's get a little resistance training going. Let's get some steps in. That's the starting point and it's the long game. There's never. We don't end a workout and be like, all right, I'm done working out forever. Cold plunging is very similar to other systems within our body, is that this is a long game we're playing. And when we start out, just do something that's attainable, that's achievable, that stresses you out a little. We do want that stress response, but there is a threshold that's too far. So it's a journey of learning our body. So really, when you're starting out, don't press it too hard. I saw a question here. Someone's going through some sickness, severe bronchitis or Covid. And we've seen some real results from people with COVID But the thing I would say, and we've seen other side to it as well, but the key is starting out at a temperature that's manageable. Don't go jumping in at 39 degrees, especially if your immune system is compromised in this time. It's like you want to start out at a much higher temperature and learn to breathe and relax and regulate yourself through that.

Yeah, that's a great, that's great advice. Dawn says, I've been having a four minute cold plunge shower each morning for two weeks now. And she says, I hate getting in, but I love how I feel afterwards. My son also has a daily cold plunge showers. I'm trying to talk my husband into it. I keep telling him how great I feel afterwards. Awesome, Don. And you know, usually I find it's the other way around. Usually it's the husband trying to talk to wife into cold plunging. So good for you for leading the charge. I'm also going to send you an ultimate human swag pack. So that is, that is awesome. And just like I said, you don't need to spend a lot of money on a Fancy Cold Punch. 4 minute cold showers is a great way to start experiencing the benefits of cold plunging. That's why when Ryan decided to do this pop up plunge, there are pipes on the outside of that plunge so you could upgrade to a chiller if you wanted to or if you, you decided that it wasn't for you, you know, you're only in for 100, 120 bucks. 150 bucks. And I really, I really like that idea and I appreciate that plunge did that for us so we could get as many people experiencing this as possible. You notice the one common theme between all of the people, you know, commenting in this chat. And this is why I love for everybody to just see the chat. That's why I love having the live Q and A, is that so far no one is having a negative experience, right? People are having difficult time staying in because it's too cold or a hard time taking that first, you know, plunge into cold water. But the people that actually go through it and do it, whether it's a cold shower or putting ice in their tub or getting into an actual cold plunge, they're, they're just saying it's one of the things that really, really changed our life. So for you first timers, you know, listen to, you know, what these guys are experiencing. You know, when they, when they went through their first cold plunge. I actually just left my favorite place on earth, which is a small town in Colorado called Pitkin. It's outside of Gunnison. My wife and I have a little retreat there in the mountains. We have a log cabin and it's completely off the grid. Solar fed electricity, glacier fed spring water, you know, well, in septic. If you follow me on Instagram, you see that I got deer coming up in the morning, eating my flowers. I got a little freeloading fox named Freddy. And I say he's a freeloader because it's very one way relationship. And I, and he, he'll, he'll sometimes come up and take ham right out of your hand. And what's so cool is, is he'll take a piece of ham and then he goes out in the field and he'll, he catches a field mouse and he brings a warm, soggy field mouse up and he drops it on my, the step of my cabin. I guess it's his way of saying thank you. So when I'm there though, there's, there's running glacier streams. And I'll tell you what, man, if you get in a running cold water like that, it's about 40, 43 degrees. It is just so exhilarating to be outside in the sunlight in the, you know, in the woods and jumping into one of those streams, it's like, it's absolutely my drug of choice. So, Ryan, you got two, two plunges behind you. Oh, you've got the, you've got the sauna in that room. Can, can you take us over and show us the fully assembled One.

So I got. I got on in here that hasn't hit the market yet. That our marketing team will crush me if I show it on this video.

Oh, they are.

All right.

Are you gonna show it anyway?

This is our XL here. Yeah, we're very, very excited on this. It's tough to tell in this room, but we did some cool things on it. Actually made the. Not that a bunch of people are into it, but it's. We made the door wide enough and all the benches could flip up on the inside. So you could actually put like a stationary bike in there to do some heat adaptive training, if you're into that. We can. You can also. It's long enough to do yoga in here, so we want it to be kind of multifunctional. So you, you know, it can crank to 230 if you want that super high heat, traditional sauna experience. But if you want to do it at like a lower temperature, 110, and do some workouts in there, some kettlebell swings, some stationary bike work, it's accredited for that. We made the back at about a 15 degree angle back there. I don't know if you can really see it, but it's, it's. So. It's more ergonomic. It's the only sauna that's ergonomic friendly, so you can kind of get your back. You're not at like a full upright position or even like a curled barrel position. Yeah, it's. We're really proud. We spent a lot of time on this design work and it's been great. That's.

That's, that's awesome. I mean, I have the freebie. I have the previous version to that myself, and it has the slope back, so when you go inside, you don't. You don't feel claustrophobic at all. So we've got about 10 minutes until we're transitioning to our cold plunge challenge, guys. So get, get your, get your gear on. You know, ladies, get your bathing suits on. Guys, get your board shorts on. Or as my podcast director calls it, water pants. Put your water pants on. And we've got about 10 minutes until our first, you know, group cold plunge. Can you talk about doing a cold shower versus a plunge? Should you stand there or move around to allow the water to hit various parts of your body front and back and still do the breathing? So here's how I recommend that you do a cold shower. So first of all, go in, do whatever you're going to do for your shower. Lather up. So, you know, Your conditioner, your body wash. Do that at your regular temperature, and then step out of the water and turn the shower as cold as it will go. Let the shower run for 30 seconds to a minute so it's nice and cold. And then what I do is I do the same breath work technique. Right. On your fourth breath, step all the way into that stream of water and let the water hit you right in the face on your forehead. Make sure that the shower hits you straight in the face. This is especially important if you're doing a cold shower because this will immediately activate the mammalian dive reflex. And believe it or not, it will instantly calm you down. It will help you shift from sympathetic to that parasympathetic state. You have no choice over this. And so you breathe out while that water is hitting you. And then I would stand in that position for about 15 to 30 seconds. And then I would slowly turn my body around and I would let it hit the back of my neck and run down my back. Once you've done that, and now you get to about one minute, you're, you're over the shock, you're over that, that, that urge to hyperventilate. And then I actually start reaching my arms up into the shower and trying to find any area on my body that's actually still warm and trying to have the water hit that area of my body. You'd be shocked how fast the, the areas of your body that are directly in contact with that water adjust. And how you, you go from being panic stricken and wanting to jump out to actually going, wow, this feels, this actually feels really good. And I push my hands right up into the stream of water, let it run under your arms, let it run down the sides of your body, start turning around, start trying to find those areas of your body that are still warm and let the water hit it. And then I would always end by putting my face back into the stream of water and letting it run over my head, and then step back out and get out and dry off. And you will feel amazing. And again, just like with cold plunging, you can start with 30 seconds to a minute, work your way up to three minutes. Not a lot of benefits you're going to get from a cold shower after about that amount of time. Hector Raid has asked, should we do the breath work before or after the cold plunge? Actually, neither. I would do the breath work in the cold plunge. So one of my, so I do the four breaths, I get into the cold plunge. Your actual breath work routine, do that right when you wake up I do it within 30 minutes of waking every morning. But to be hyper specific about the breathwork technique that I use in, in the plunge is it's called box breathing. And everybody has a method that they like, you know best. If you're like hyper vigilant and a perfectionist like my wife, she gets stressed out doing box breathing because it's a 4 second inhale, 4 second hold, 4 second exhale, and a 4 second hold. And she gets stressed out that she's not getting exactly four seconds. So if you're one of those people, just focus like Ryan said on a, on an inhale and having your exhale be twice as long going out. So breathe out through a straw. That way you're not striving for perfection in box breathing. For those of you that are not hyper perfectionists, box breathing is a great technique. It actually was perfected by the US Special forces as a way to reduce brain catecholamines, which is a fancy way of saying to reduce the fight or flight response and to lower the adrenaline response in our body. So right before a combat mission or a very intensive engagement, they will do box breathing, which is 4/2nd inhale, 4/2nd hold, 4/2nd exhale, 4/2 hold, 4/2nd inhale. And you just keep tracing that box, right, for, for those of you that don't want to trace that box in your mind, 4 seconds, 4 seconds, 4 seconds and 4 seconds to the technique that Brian said or Ryan said. And just focus on making your exhale twice as long as your inhale. I find that really focusing on your breathing allows you to tune out all of the rest of your environment. You're going to see me do that today when we get in the cold plunge. And I've got to plunge out on my balcony right now. I've got a bunch of ice stacked up out there. We've dumped some in and made it really cold. And as soon as I get in there, I'm going to focus on my breathing and I'm either going to take a big inhale breath and breathe out for twice as long through an imaginary straw, or I'll do the box breathing technique. I find that both of those work really well. What do you think, Ryan? Did I mute, did you mute yourself?

I think I got muted. I think yes, I would say for breath, like while you're in, just keep it simple, don't overthink it. Just, you know, your mind's gonna want to, it's gonna tell you, get out, get out, get out, get out. It's gonna Happen. I'm telling everyone, you know, gonna let you in. It's what's, what's gonna happen and it's gonna, you know, focus in on that breath. I would also say the distinction between showers and full body immersion, it is a little different. You are going to get that dopamine, that rush of energy on both of them. That's going to happen. But it is a little different in how your body adapts where the, the shower actually I, I think it's a little even more challenging because you're getting this contrast where it's only a part of your body that's getting that cold, cold water hitting it where the rest of the body's kind of not being, not being hit with the cold water and you can't actually, it's a little tougher to relax into it. So just take a note for everyone that's doing the shower, it is a little different experience than when your full body submerged in, kind of down regulate yourself. A shower is a, it's, it's a little more challenging to calm yourself in compared to a, you know, a pop up barrel or you filled a trough up or you have a plunge at your house. They are, they are subtly different experiences.

I love what Jenny says. She says, ladies, it's great for your hair as well. You will notice your hair is smooth and shiny. Amazing side benefit. That's amazing. You know it's so funny. Like usually when I'm trying to convince women to get in cold plunging, it's, it's like peripheral vasoconstriction, they don't care. Cold shock protein, they don't care. And you know your thermostat, your, your dopamine race. But then I go, is really good for fat loss. They're like, all right, I'm in. And that's, and that's usually the catalyst to get them in. So now, now I, I, I've got another one. It's great for your hair. I didn't know that Jenny. That's awesome. So I really want to congratulate everybody that's doing this for the first time. It's plunge time. We're going to be doing a three minute plunge today. So I'm going to head outside to my pop up and my team is going to be switching cameras. So give me about a minute to get back online. I'm just going to transition from here to the other camera that we have on the, on the plunge. Guys, it's time. This is why you're here. So get, you know, get into Your shower, by the way, if you're, if you are showering or cold plunging, your turn your camera off. I actually had that, that happen before on, on challenge where people forget they have the camera on. So. But if you're in board short bikini, then by all means participate. I want all of us to see it. You can hold the camera up. You can have your kids hold the camera up or your husbands, your wives. So give me about one minute, guys. I'm going to transition to outside, and then we're going to do this together. Three minute cold plunge. Here we go. And Ryan, I see he's set up too.

I am.

Oh, that was bad. All right, we got sound. We got sound.

Yeah.

Am I live?

Oh.

All right, guys, here we go. This is the moment we all been waiting for. Just for. For those of you that are joining us and don't have a pop up plunge, you're doing this in your, in your bathtub or if you're doing it in your shower grate. These bags of ice were about $1.80. So three of those bags ice is going to run you about six bucks. Another trick is to just, if that's not in your budget, just take Tupperware, fill it full of water, and freeze that Tupperware and just put the blocks of ice into your, into your, into your bathtub so it doesn't have to be an expensive endeavor. Oh, boy, that's nice and chilly.

We're gonna make it a little, a.

Little bit more excited.

I'm gonna put a little bit more.

Ice in here and get it down just a little bit more. Now I can't see Ryan, but I assume he's by his plunge as well.

I'm here.

All right.

Now it's nice and shut.

Oh, there's Ryan. All right, I'm gonna make it really nice and chilly. Ryan's got his shirt off. He's ready to go. Okay, so here's what I'm gonna do, guys. I'm gonna do those four breaths, remember? And on the fourth breath, I'm gonna inhale and I'm gonna step into the plunge and exhale until I'm all the way down. All right, ready? Here we go. We're in. Okay, so now that I'm in, let's just focus on our breath. Nice big breath in and exhale slowly. Nice breath in and exhale slowly.

What's that?

So you can get the mammalian dive reflex by taking your blue light blocking glasses off and going underwater. Activate that mammalian dive reflex. Wow, I feel amazing. So we're at. Can somebody give me a time.

On.

My team or about 30 seconds. Okay, so we're at 45 seconds. So guys, stick with it. If you make it to a minute, you'll make it all the way to three minutes. If you feel like you have to get out, then go ahead and get out. You've already made it 45 seconds. You're creeping up on a minute. So just focus on your breath. Deep inhale. Exhale through a straw. Nice deep inhale.

Halfway.

There. You are. Halfway. Guys, we're at a minute and a half. Another trick is you can leave your hands out. I know a lot of people get really cold fingers and really cold toes. Sometimes you can even order those booties online that go over your ankles and your toes if you have a real problem with circulation. Sometimes I leave my hands out. Sometimes I pull my hands in. But leaving your hands out also seems to help people. Especially first time cold plungers. Really seems to. It's funny, I'm like short of breath. It really helps cold plungers because, you know, your hands are not aching. Gives you one less thing to worry about. So. So what's that? Yeah, I mean, look, guys, I'm. I'm six foot three and I'm all the way down to my neck in this, in this plunge. I love this little thing. I mean, for 120 bucks with your discount, you got a plunge. And then somewhere around here is the, are the, the inlet valves that actually hook up to the chiller. So at another point down the road, when you win the local lottery, you can actually buy the chiller and just hook it right up to the plunge. And you got yourself a plunge. Okay, so then let's just go back to our breathing. Nice, deep breath in and exhale through a straw. Nice, deep breath in and exhale through a straw. And guess what? We're there. We made it Three minutes. Guys, you ought to feel really good about yourself, especially if you're a first timer. You should be in a great mood right now. You probably feel amazing like I do.

So.

Oh, I got my lunch towel right here. You know what? I'm going to send out a couple of these too. If you are a first timer and you made it all three minutes, I want you to text in all caps, I made it with a big exclamation point. And if you text I made it into the chat. Then the first 10 people, I'm going to send you one of these plunge towels so that you can tell the world that you just did your first punch. How you feeling, guys? Text in the chat, let me know how you're feeling. Don't go over to your computer with wet fingers. That is amazing.

Everyone finishing up.

You can access this every day of your life for free. Do I feel like my voice has risen a little bit? Like I'm a little bit more excited? That's how you feel getting out of the cold punch. How you doing, Ryan?

I'm doing great. And this is a good opportunity for everyone. Do some air squats, maybe a couple push ups. If you got a little rebounder, just kind of get that blood flowing back through the body. And this is a good time to kind of start to warm the body back up. But enjoy, enjoy this feeling and my, my chat. The secondary challenge I have for everyone. Over this next three days, we go on this journey, see how you feel, see how your mood is, check in with yourself at night, be like, hey, how was my day today? Did I feel a little bit better? Was it? And let's see where we're at after three days because that's the magic of this. Yeah, we feel incredible now, but the real goal is that we have incredible days and we feel great throughout the day. So check in and we'll do the check ins throughout the week. But, dude, honored and grateful to be plunging with everyone on this feed here.

Brian, I can't tell you how much I appreciate it, brother. I mean, your plunge has changed my life. It's changed the life of thousands and thousands of people. You know, I just, I appreciate the, you know, the entrepreneurialism, you know, starting from scratch, you know, starting in your garage and building it into this beautiful company that you have that is really, you know, customer focused. So I'm, I'm, I couldn't be more proud to be affiliated with you guys and to be doing this challenge with you guys. And I do recommend your punch to everybody that I, that I come across. And now you've got a personal interaction with the founder, the owner. He's not being paid to be here, guys. He's here because he wants everybody to join it. And if you notice, we're not hard selling cold plunges. We just want you guys to know the benefits of cold water therapy. So, guys, thank you so much for joining this challenge. Remember, we're back again tomorrow, so thank you so much for joining this challenge. For all my rule breakers and VIPs, we're going to take a break until 11:15. I'm going to let you guys give you some time to change and dry off, fuel up, and then come back for the Q and A portion of the call. I'm going to extend the call till 12:15. I always want to give my rule breakfast time to ask questions, guys. If you're not a vip, now's the time to join my VIP group. You know, jump in. Listen, if you don't get more than $47 worth of benefit, I will give you your money back. I want to be as interactive and direct with you as possible. And you know, the, the big benefits are when we can interact personally and I can answer your questions. But for the rest of you guys, thank you so much for giving me your time today. I hope that you got as much out of this as I did, and I'll see the rest of you in 15 minutes in the rural breakfast VIP.