How many calories will use lose in a cold (not ice) bath?

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  • aedreana
    aedreana Posts: 979 Member
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    There may be an element of truth in this theory, because most of the calories we consume go toward keeping our body temperature up to normal. Personally, I am willing to endure deprivation (dieting)-- but not torture (ice bath or exercise).
  • paperpudding
    paperpudding Posts: 9,079 Member
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    This thread came up in "my topics" - for the life of me,couldn't remember it.

    That's because I posted in it over a year ago :laugh:
  • Nige_Gsy
    Nige_Gsy Posts: 163 Member
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    In: Calorie Count [Edit categories]
    Answers.com > Wiki Answers > Categories > Health > Nutrition > Calorie Count > Do cold baths and showers help you burn a lot of calories?
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    Your body generates heat when it is cold by shivering. This muscle fasiculation produces heat, just like jogging or walking does. It is one of the bodies mechanisms for survival in extreme situations, in addition to dilating the blood vessles in the skin, however it is not a good way to lose weight. (Note non extreme alternatives in next paragraph below) The risks of hyothermia, frostbite, shock, etc. are not worth it. Losing weight is very simple, you must burn more calories than you take in, so either eat less or be more active or both to lose weight.

    YET, you do not have to do extreme temperature changes to cause the body to work harder to maintain your core body temperature, and burn more calories doing it. A cold shower hitting your neck and upper back for 10 minutes at a temperature of 72 degrees is enough to make your body burn lots of calories to maintain warmth. OR sitting back and watching TV with a large ice pack hitting your neck and back (with a T-Shirt in between) for 20 minutes will do just a good a job. Though extremes in this area could be simply a 20 min ice bath as well (but the ice pack or cold shower are 60% as effective as an ice bath).

    Swimmers are thin and muscular due to the cold water drawing off the heat from their bodies and the body compensating for it.

    Read more: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Do_cold_baths_and_showers_help_you_burn_a_lot_of_calories#ixzz1eyf7ijAi

    A perfect example of why you should not believe everything you read. :smile:

    Not least because swimmers are thin and muscular because of their diet and training regime, never mind the rest of the hyped claims for the cold water effect. There is no doubt that there is a thermodynamic effect, and marginally increased metabolism; but it is not significant. As a person that windsurfs throughout the year, and swims in the sea for 8 months or more, there is no significant change in my weight over the winter :smile:
  • __Di__
    __Di__ Posts: 1,631 Member
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    edited to remove my posting as this thread is from 2011.
  • mafjmafj
    mafjmafj Posts: 1 Member
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    It's old thread, but will add some research based knowledge as there is so much confusion.

    There has been some old research done on the matter. The main outcome were figures showing thermal conductivity TC of skin during immersion in water when resting or swimming. This was gathered experimentally by exposing subjects to various conditions and measuring consumption of oxygen in the air they breathed.

    To sum up skin thermal conductivity varied greatly across subjects depending on their obesity, however it was fairly stable in thin subjects, while decreasing with water temperature decrease in obese subjects.

    These are the thermal conductivity figures in kcal/m2/h/C (skin conductivity in kcal per surface of skin in square meters, per time in hours, per temperature difference between body and water in centigrade).


    Obese resting 9
    Obese swimming 13
    Thin resting 18
    Thin swimming 24

    How to use it

    calories = TC * (36.6 - <water temperature in centigrade>) * <body surface in m2> * <time in hours>

    Body surface can be looked up with online calculators, could be 2 square meters of 6ft high, 180 pounds men.

    E.g. such a man (not too thin, so take middle ground and assume TC of 20) during 45 minutes (0.75 of hour) of recreational swimming in water of temperature 18 Celsius would burn:

    20 * (36.6 - 18) * 2 * 0.75 = 558 kcal


    Note: one indeed gets very hungry after such an exercise and it's best to control that.

    Hope that helps.
  • mph323
    mph323 Posts: 3,565 Member
    edited January 2018
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    WinoGelato wrote: »
    Alatariel75 wrote: »
    bnicksic wrote: »
    Sounds like ppl should just answer her question if they can and get off their high horses about her health..

    Looks like some people should check the date, this thread is 7 years old.

    And welcome to MFP. It's a terrible place where people care about other's health and not just their confined questions.

    What's with the zombie posts today?

    Ha, I was just about to reply to the "burns 110 calories for each 10 minutes" post when I skimmed down and caught the zombie thread notice posted in 2014!
  • ladyhusker39
    ladyhusker39 Posts: 1,406 Member
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    So was this the "fad du jour" in 2011? Freaky!
  • Psychgrrl
    Psychgrrl Posts: 3,177 Member
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    JaydedMiss wrote: »
    i think youd of burned ALOT of calories if you were still in said ice bath 7 years later, But not because of the ice bath xD

    Yeah, brain freeze! :wink:

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