H3O Saunas, run by business partners John Miller and Kimberley Kerry, brings pop-up beach saunas to the coastline in Sunderland and South Tyneside.
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00:00So can you start by asking about where the idea for a pop-up sauna and plunge pool came from?
00:04We used to use them ourselves, so both run a lot, both done sports over the years,
00:10both had stressful jobs and like everyone's stressful lives, so we found it was really
00:15beneficial to use the existing saunas and cold water dipping, that's mainly was at the time
00:22north of the river here, so we kind of used it as part of our training and everyday kind of routine.
00:29And what's the therapeutic benefit? I know you can either go pool then sauna then pool,
00:32but what's the therapeutic benefit to that?
00:35So if someone hasn't been before and doesn't have a set plan,
00:39we would recommend you start in the sauna, you heat up for about 10 to 12 minutes and the benefits
00:44of that are it opens your blood vessels, gets your blood vessels dilated, gets the blood flow going
00:50and it starts your sweating, so opens your pores and gets you sweating. On its own that's beneficial
00:56itself, there's loads of research now that's been proven that saunas are good for the cardiovascular
01:00system, good for the heart. What we like about this particular type of sauna is people can tailor
01:07the heat they want depending on where they're sitting, so we'll fire it up and get it as hot
01:12as people are comfortable with, the stones heat up as well and that moisture in the air makes it feel
01:18hotter as well, but you can very much position yourself depending on, hot at the back where you've
01:23got the glue and the stones and if some people decide to have a slightly less intense heat by
01:29moving more around to the to where the door is. The cold water therapy, it's been used for years,
01:35it's been as part of people's training programs, the cryogenics that people will be aware of
01:41and the idea is you dip into the cold water whether it be the sea or one of the plunge pools
01:46and it does the opposite to the heat obviously, it constricts the blood vessels,
01:53it activates your body to start heating up and get your metabolism going, activates that brown fat,
01:58so on its own it's good if you do both together you're getting that cardiovascular workout, so
02:03whether it be recovery preparation for sport or whether it be mental health to get that sort of
02:09relaxing feeling. A lot of people describe when they're in the sauna they feel sort of switched
02:15off from everything else, it's their little sort of sanctuary and likewise in the sea people get
02:20once the breathing settles they feel like they really sort of get into a relaxed zone there so
02:24the benefits are both physical and mental. We've got a few events coming up this year, so there's
02:30tidal trails which is at South Shields in the summer and that's a run event put on by Events
02:37of the North and we'll have the sauna and the plunge pools at the end for recovery after
02:43their runs. And continue to work with Washington Running Club who often go for a run then they'll
02:48come and use the sauna and the cold plunge or the sea. We've collaborated with CrossFit
02:57tailored training in Washington where we set up outside of the gym, we set up the sauna and the
03:02plunge pools and people were able to either use that as a rest day recovery or train then use them
03:07and we were at University of Sunderland last week where there was a varsity
03:13event where they were competing against York Uni and people were able to just come and use
03:18the sauna and the plunge pools after their events or before depending on when they needed.
03:24So we've got our Instagram and Facebook accounts and the Bookman link is on both of them. We're
03:31just in the process of setting up our website as well so that should be up and running in the next
03:35week or so.