Research Outreach Blog
June 24, 2022

Winter swimming: The latest craze that could improve your physical and mental health

Outdoor swimming was once considered an exclusively summer activity, but swimming outside through the winter – when the water temperature can be as low as 0oC – has seen a huge increase in popularity in recent years. It can be hard to imagine why people would swim in such bracing water, but the many physical and mental health benefits could explain why.

To understand why winter swimming is so beneficial, it is important to know how your body responds to being submerged in such extreme temperatures. When you enter the water, you experience what’s known as a ‘cold shock response’. This causes your blood pressure and heart rate to increase, with associated rapid breathing and gasping. These sensations can cause panic if you’re not used to it, but the initial shock should subside after a minute or two of immersion. Your body then diverts blood flow from your limbs to your core to protect your vital organs; this can make your arms and legs numb and tingly. Hypothermia is a significant risk, and can be life threatening – novice winter swimmers are recommended to spend no longer than two minutes in the water per degree temperature – so if the water is five degrees you shouldn’t stay in for more than ten minutes. Around five minutes after you get out of cold water, the cool blood from your arms and legs starts to mix with the warm blood from your core, which makes your core body temperature drop slightly. This reduction in body temperature – known as ‘after drop’ – can continue for quite a while after you get out of the water, so you might feel fine at first but be shivering violently or even hypothermic 20 minutes later. Get dressed quickly in lots of warm layers; hot drink and some food will help – and it’s best not to swim alone.

Benefits to your cardiovascular system
Your body’s response to cold water helps to improve your circulation by stimulating increased blood flow through your arteries, veins, and capillaries, as your blood rushes to protect your core organs. This makes your heart pump blood more efficiently which in turn improves the transport of oxygen and nutrients around your body.

Immune and lymphatic system benefits
The large network of vessels in your lymphatic system is an important link between your immune and cardiovascular systems, and removes disease-causing microbes from the body. Immersion in cold-water makes your lymph vessels contract, forcing lymph fluids around your body, collecting microbes along the way. This gives your immune system a boost because removing harmful microorganisms increases the number of white blood cells we have available to fight future infections.

Swimming in cold water helps to improve your circulation by stimulating increased blood flow through your arteries, veins and capillaries.

Pain relief
Research has found that regular winter swimming can help relieve joint pain and inflammation associated with rheumatoid arthritis, and help with fibromyalgia which causes pain all around the body. Traditionally, these diseases have been treated using whole-body cryotherapy, which exposes patients to very cold air for a few minutes, but winter swimming has been found to be just as effective.

Improving mental health
The low-level stress we experience in our everyday lives can contribute to negative mental health. Just learning you can endure cold water, even for a few minutes, can be a confidence boost, but regular cold-water swimming can also help us manage stress. Cold water shock triggers our ‘fight or flight’ response, and it is thought that regular cold-water swimming attenuates this stress response, effectively enabling us to adapt to it and better manage the stress we experience elsewhere in life.

Swimming with others brings important social benefits, and exercising in beautiful landscapes brings us all closer to nature – another reason why people are increasingly drawn to outdoor swimming, whatever the season.

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