YouTube video transcript of a conversation between Ben Greenfield and Luke Storey touring Luke’s homemade ice bath and discussing practical setup, safety, and protocols. Covers: construction (a chest freezer inside a custom case), grounding and timer safety, water filtration/cleaning methods, temperature ranges (typically 35–40°F; observed ~47–48°F), and recommended exposure and breathing practices (breathwork before/during; 2–5 minute “sweet spot”; caution beyond ~10 minutes). Discusses training effects of cold timing (cold before can improve performance; prolonged cold immediately after (>10 minutes) can blunt muscle-building), vagal activation techniques (box breathing, 4/8 breathing, humming, face submersion), and logistics for alternating cold with exercise/sauna. Also promotes Ben’s book Boundless (608 pages; original manuscript ~1200 pages) and provides web link.
Questions this video answers
Typically 35–40°F (transcript: 'Usually I keep it at 35 to 40').
About 47–48°F (transcript: 'it's only at about 47 right now' and 'today it's 48').
Under about 55°F ('as long as it's under 55, you're getting a lot of the benefits').
About 2–5 minutes ('I personally like about the two to five minute sweet spot').
Around 10 minutes or longer ('Once you get past about 10 minutes... hypoglycemic drop' and '10 minutes or longer is sufficient to drop the muscle temp... blunt the muscle building response').
Chapters
You always have to warm up for an ice bath by jumping up and down on a trampoline. Otherwise, the ice bath is waste of time, horribly ineffective.
It's a great way to put on a lot of muscle and get jacked. Jump up and down on a trampoline?
I'm joking, but it's good for lymph flow. I have one in my living room close to my office. In between, when I'm taking breaks from work, I'll just jump up and down for a little while just to get some blood flowing.
Okay, so here we are at the homemade ice bath. Now, for complete plans on this ice bath, you can Google Luke. Ben Greenfield, Ice bath. And I sent him all of the plans.
I have all the plans published on my website, yours and Rick Rubin's setup. And I also. I don't know if I told you, you have a shout out in my new. Because I put some of the stuff in there, too, and talk about your setup.
Oh, thanks, dude.
I appreciate that. Yeah. There's a new company I'm looking into now called Marozco Forge that does, like, a 31 to 32 degree ice bath that stays at that temperature even in, like 110 degrees of ambient.
Oh, that's so awesome.
Yeah, it's like a unit like this they ship to your house, so.
So this guy here looks a lot cooler from the outside because I had my handyman build a case, but inside you have a Sears chest freezer, and I just filled it up, so it's only at about 47 right now. Usually I keep it at 35 to 40, but I changed the water yesterday because I knew I had company. They'll still get your attention. And then I put a copper ground wire in it that's screwed into the ground with a big corkscrew stainless steel plug so that you're grounded while you're in here. Another important thing. Let me step beside you here, Ben.
Yeah.
Another important thing about it, to regulate the temperature is to have it on a timer, which is like a Christmas light timer, but you always want to make sure it's turned off before you get in. You don't want to get in something electric with water in it. Super important. So you can tell it's on because the light will be on or off. So as long as I have it on timer, mine's set to come on like three or four hours in the.
Middle of the night.
And that keeps it at the right temperature. And other than that, it's like a one and done.
And then you clean with what do you do? Food grade hydrogen, perhaps?
You know what I do to clean it? Sometimes I bring my ozone generator up here and I dip the water ozonator in there and I'll run it for like an hour. Yeah, but I had this old stuff. This is like some old school, like raw food, vegan era shit from the early 2000s that ended up probably going bankrupt. It's called Adya Clarity. And this is what people were using back in the day to purify drinking water. And then it came out that it was really unsafe. But basically they're sulfate minerals. And you pour maybe half a cup in here and in 24 hours you'll see all of the impurities in the tap water and all of the hardness, all the minerals all floats to the bottom and makes like this brown dust.
Sulfate minerals. Yeah.
It's crazy. So it's a really great water purification.
Cool. But then Adja.
Yeah. And I don't know if they sell it anymore because there was a lot of controversy.
It says Adya Water.
It was some hippie shit they had. And then this is the shower filter that I used to fill it up, which is like a garden hose filter that takes out some of the chlorine and heavy metals and toxins and stuff. So first I filter that, then I do the object clarity. And then I just change the water when it starts to get fungal from germs and stuff. You want to go first or second?
Dig it? Sure. Jump in. So in many cases, before you do an ice bath, if you really want to pair the breathwork to the ice bath, you can do kind of a breathe up to prepare your nervous system. And that would involve, for example, you can do the seated or.
Lying or squatting if you're concerned about passing out, for example. But you just do a series and sometimes a few rounds of just like a basic.
Cr.
You'll generally hold that exhale as long as you can. Gives you a little bit of a nitric oxide release. And usually a few rounds of that really prepares your nervous system. If you're going to do a long cold soak and then you just get in.
There's also a bolt on your butt end, so careful not to sit on the bolt.
A bolt.
It's where the plug is in the bottom.
Which way do you usually go? Put on that end so you face this way.
Yeah. Then your feet. Well, your feet will hit the vault and see.
But.
It'S taken me a while to find a plug that doesn't take.
And the key with the ice Bath is to train yourself to kind of suppress that sharp intake of breath, that mammalian dive reflex that's kind of that sympathetic response. You kind of want to train yourself to not engage in that, to not and to instead engage in some kind of breathing that kind of settles the body as you're in the bath. I like a box breathing or a four eight breathing. So box breathing is four count in.
Four count hold.
Four count out.
Four count hold.
And the four eight breathing is simply four count in.
Eight count out. And I like to do the out count through purse lips.
If you want a little bit extra vagal nerve activation when you exhale, you can kind of make a humming noise like this four count in.
Because the ice bath is going to help with your nervous system tone as it is. But humming, chanting, singing, gargling, all of that will enhance it a little bit. And then if you can, you always want to get the face under because that's where you get the most amount of cranial nerve and vagal nerve activation.
And like Luke and I were talking about in the kitchen, you can do two minutes, you can do five minutes. Once you get past about 10 minutes, sometimes you will find you get that hypoglycemic drop.
It can tend to get a little bit stressful if you overdo it. But I personally like about the two to five minute sweet spot. And if you're doing rounds between the ice bath and a bike or a trampoline, or rounds between the ice bath and the sauna, sometimes you can go shorter than that or do like a 3 minute ice bath, 3 minute exercise, back to the ice bath, etc. So I'll give Luke a chance to get his chill on.
I crave this water.
Oh, it feels so good.
Yeah, we got up easy today. It's only at about 48. Yeah, sometimes it's, it's a bit more jarring, but you still, from what I understand, as long as it's under 55.
Yeah, under about 55, you're getting a lot of the benefits.
But I think you really nailed the main point and that is to keep your breath regulated. Yeah, I find most people that aren't used to this when they get in there instinctively. I mean, it's grit the teeth, tighten the jaw. It's funny too because like, I've dunked really tough fucking guys in this thing. Just big, ripped, burly men's men. And they get in here, it always cracks me up.
Like muscularity, fitness, etc. Is not necessarily synonymous with vagal nerve tone or the Ability to be able to quickly activate the parasympathetic nervous system. And just because you're yang doesn't mean you're Zen. Right?
And I'm halfway joking. I'm not trying to clown because that would be obvious that I'm jealous, that I'm not a huge ripped beast of a man. But it's just funny. You think, oh, someone's really tough, and then you get them in here and you're like, whoa, dude, why is this so hard? But it's just that.
You have to tone your nervous system in order to handle different types of stress. Whether it's, you know, having a confrontational negotiation at work or disagreement with someone you're having a relationship with, or getting an ice bath. It's all the same nervous system that freaks out. And the same techniques work to calm your nervous system no matter what the external stressor is. And so this is a good teacher for me to learn how to breathe.
Yeah.
If you get in here and you just.
Even one or two of those right when I get in, I mean, today it's not very cold. It's 48, so it's kind of refreshing. But when it's 35, I'll still get that when I get in for a second. But if I take a couple deep breaths, I get this really calm meditative state. Yeah.
The more stressed you are too, on any given day, the more difficult that ice bath is, Just because it's that much more tricky to down regulate the sympathetic nervous system.
This is a question I got for you, which I'm pretty convinced I have the answer for intuitively. But what I used to do is I would work out and, you know, do some kind of weight training or whatever, and then I would take an ice bath because I love just cooling down the inflammation and not being sore. And then I got to thinking, if you're trying to build muscle, you want inflammation after you work out. So now I do an ice bath, then I work out.
Yeah, doing the. Doing the cold first can really elevate your ability to be able to work out harder afterwards. As long as the cold isn't so long that the muscles are getting super duper cold. So you gotta warm them back up. Cold after is only gonna blunt the muscle building response. If it is significant. 10 minutes or longer is sufficient to drop the muscle temp enough to where you don't get that inflammatory response. But a quick cold soak after a workout is great because you decrease the core temp, you reactivate the parasympathetic Nervous. So like two minutes is fine. But you wouldn't want to do like a 10 minute ice bath, which unfortunately, you know, a lot of football teams, et cetera, they got the ice baths and locker rooms. A lot of people are doing that post scrimmage or post workout. But you save that longer cold exposure or that de inflammatory type of cold stimuli for later on in the day or at least a couple hours after the workout.
Right, yeah, noted.
All right. Yeah.
Because I definitely noticed when I do the ice bath before I work out, I'm way stronger and I get way less winded and fatigued.
I have a whole article on my website by Brad Kearns about like just the whole mechanism behind pre cooling before exercise. And it can have a pretty cool pun intended effect. All right, good.
I'm glad I got a chance to talk to you about that.
Yeah.
Because I'll do my X3 bar, right. I dry off and then I do that and I'm like, holy shit. I can do way more reps when I'm cold than if I'm already hot.
Yeah, well, I've got about 10 minutes before I gotta be boogieing away.
Cool.
So I think we covered a lot of stuff.
We did, dude.
And so I guess what we should do probably is tell people where they can find more because my audience might not be familiar with you yet. I don't know if your audience is familiar with me, but what I am going to do is when Luke gets me all this audio and everything and video for you guys, I'll put my version of it over@BenGreenfield Fitness.com Lukestory It's s t O R E Y and I'll link to his website lukestory.com and the articles that I've done like about his ice bath set up on my website. So you guys can go to my flavor of the show notes@bengreentwellfitness.com Lukestory and I'm sure Luke will have his own happy place where this show is as well. Yeah.
When we do the final edits and I do my intro, I'll give the links for various things like this, but it'll be on my YouTub Luke store. YouTube is where the video will be. And then obviously if people are hearing this right now, they'll be listening to the podcast and it's, it's, it's been great because my original plan was like, oh cool, come over, shoot a little video and then we'll record a podcast. But the video has been so in depth, it's like, wow, this actually is a perfect podcast.
It is like we covered a lot of stuff, so I know we still on Facebook live as well.
Yeah.
Cool. Well, thank you guys for, for coming along for the ride. Hopefully people picked up something.
Tell us about the book that you have coming out because this is probably gonna come after New Year's.
So if this comes out after New Year's, then my book is now available. It's currently available for people who are watching the live for pre order and it's called Boundless. The entire book, all 608 pages of it, is designed to help you unlock boundless energy day in and day out. It's chock full of anti aging and longevity protocols. It's got a ton in there on sleep hacking, on jet lag, on, on immune system, on mold, mycotoxins, lyme. I just cover soup to nuts, brain, body. And also spiritual enhancement, gratitude, even, you know, delve into psychedelics and some of these energy medicine, sound medicine protocols. And it's all available right now@boundlessbook.com that's where people can get it. 600 plus pages and the 500 plus pages that got cut from the book. The original manuscript got turned in at 1200 pages. I put available as like all bonuses on the website.
Right.
A bunch of bonus videos. So should be a fun journey for folks. It's a big book, but it's, it's everything I've wanted to write for the past three years is in there, so.
Damn, dude. Cool. Yeah, awesome. Well, I'm definitely gonna get it. Is it gonna be on audiobook?
It is audio Kindle and the hardcover is like big, beautiful, like coffee table type of book. So I like the hardcover, but it'll also be audible. It'll also be ebook as well. Cool.
All right, well, thanks for coming by, man. This is the ultra hang. This is the kind of shit that I like to do when I have a guest come by.
I dig it.
So thanks for joining me.
It's way better than just sitting around stuffing our faces with Caesar salad and having a coffee or whatever.
