As Georgia Tech’s season extends into its 15th week (including open dates), legs are heavy, bodies are sore and bruises have accumulated.
To repair the Yellow Jackets, the athletic department has enlisted technological help for a treatment beyond traditional therapies such as ice and massage — a $42,000 chamber that provides treatment through air chilled by nitrogen gas. Tech is the first college to have purchased a unit from Atlanta-based Impact Cryotherapy, which is the only U.S. company manufacturing what are known as cryotherapy chambers.
When the Jackets take the field Saturday night against Florida State to play for the ACC championship, they will do so with the benefit of having had their workout recovery accelerated by three-minute treatments at up to minus-160 degrees Celsius (minus-238 degrees Fahrenheit).
“It’s pretty much like an ice tub, except it gets your whole body,” cornerback D.J. White said. “It really helps me recover and get back well for the games because the season is a grind, as we all know. Trying to get your body back right is key, so that helps me do that.”
It is essentially a high-tech version of ice bags and tubs. Where an athlete might require 15 minutes of ice treatment, often on a specific part of the body, the cryotherapy chamber requires only three minutes and envelops the entire body. The chamber is about three feet by six feet and about five feet high. (Shoop likened the appearance to that of an “old-timey looking sauna.”) An athlete stands in the sealed chamber, his or her head protruding from the top, as the interior fills with nitrogen vapor.
“We feel like it’s another good tool for us to help our athletes achieve the best performance they can,” Tech sports medicine director Jay Shoop said.
The technology has been popular in Europe for several years and has caught on in the United States primarily with NBA teams. Shoop said his staff had been looking into it for about a year. Its use befits a school with “technology” in its name. Shoop’s other recent purchases include an anti-gravity treadmill and a device that uses a laser to pinpoint heat treatment into deep body tissue.
“The Tech administration has been very open about us staying on the cutting edge and doing whatever we can to help our athletes,” Shoop said. “It’s been very supportive from that perspective.”
Its most common use is as a post-training recovery tool. The cold drives blood from the extremities to the body core. After the treatment, the heart pumps the blood back out to flush lactic acid and treat muscle tissue with oxygen-rich blood. Use of the chamber is voluntary, but Tech athletes have been taking about 30 treatments daily, Shoop said.
“The kids say they feel refreshed and they don’t have leg soreness,” Shoop said.
White is among the most frequent users. He said he prefers cryotherapy because of its comfort over an ice tub.
“It kind of eases you into it as opposed to the ice tub, which is more of an initial shock,” he said. “It kind of gets colder and colder as it goes along.”
One defensive tackle might even call it mild.
“I think it needs to be a bit colder for me,” Adam Gotsis said. “The last minute standing in there was pretty cold, but the first, like, minute and a half wasn’t too bad.”
Impact Cryotherapy CEO Richard Otto jokingly observed that its benefits were obvious for Tech athletes. Since the school began using the chamber in November, the men’s basketball team has beaten Georgia and the football team has defeated Clemson and Georgia.
“I don’t know if Jay agrees with me and all of my assumptions,” Otto said.
Cryotherapy also can be used for injury treatment. Defensive lineman Patrick Gamble and A-back Charles Perkins are among players who have used the chamber as part of their rehabiliation from leg injuries. Perkins said it worked, but will nonetheless stick to traditional methods.
“I like to get in the cold tub,” he said. “I’m old-fashioned.”
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