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Cold-water immersion is a popular post-workout recovery strategy, but new research suggests it may offer no greater benefit for muscle strength recovery than heat-based methods.

The study, published in the Journal of Thermal Biology, investigated how different thermal recovery strategies affect muscle recovery following exercise-induced muscle damage.

Researchers led by the University of East London found that while heat-based interventions altered several physiological markers associated with cellular stress and muscle repair, neither heat nor cold resulted in superior recovery of muscle strength over a 72-hour period.

The research involved 40 healthy, physically active adults who completed an intensive exercise protocol designed to induce temporary muscle damage and delayed-onset muscle soreness.

Researchers then monitored changes in muscle strength, muscle soreness and a range of molecular markers associated with muscle damage and inflammation over the following 72 hours.

Immediately following exercise, muscle strength decreased by approximately 36% across all groups. Although strength gradually recovered over the monitoring period, no statistically significant differences were observed among the four recovery strategies.

However, the different recovery approaches produced distinct physiological responses. Participants receiving heat-based treatments showed increased expression of heat shock protein 72 (HSP72), a cellular stress protein associated with protective and repair-related processes within muscle.

In addition, concentrations of creatine kinase-MM (CK-MM), a marker commonly associated with muscle damage, returned toward baseline more rapidly in the heat-based recovery groups than in the cold-water immersion group.

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