Clothes off, gloves on, for three minutes of treatment at minus 110 Celsius

Cryotherapy chamber: Ian O'Riordan travels to a health spa in Wexford to experience the hottest and coldest treatment in sport

According to my intrepid friend Grania Willis, the temperature on the summit of Mouth Everest can reach minus 40 degrees Celsius, causing the brain to swell and the lungs to fill with fluid. This is the human body freezing to death. Grania should know because she was up there last year.

I still think Grania is mad but after three minutes in a cryotherapy chamber I could probably dance naked on the summit of Everest. I'm not mad, although I have just stood practically naked in temperatures of minus 110 Celsius - which by my reckoning must be about the coldest place on earth.

Cryotherapy (not to be confused with cryoablation therapy, electric shock therapy, or freezing your ass off at a taxi rank on New Year's Eve) is - pardon the expression - the hottest thing in sports medicine since the leg massage. When it comes to sport most people will tell you that warm is good - and it may be, on some days - but I am here to tell you that cold is better.

"This hotel in Wexford," mumbled the sports editor. "They want us to try this new ice chamber. I reckon you're the man to do it. You still do a bit of running, don't you?"

The hotel is White's of Wexford, which recently underwent a €55-million makeover. I had heard about the ice chamber that the Irish rugby team regularly visit at the Olympic training centre at Spala, Poland.

That, as it turns out, is cryotherapy, and White's are the first to introduce it to Ireland as the centrepiece of their stunning new health spa.

In the spirit of George Plimpton I agreed to test it out but I needed to do some homework, fast. I ran into Keith Wood, told him I was going to test cryotherapy. He gave me a funny look: "Yeah, I did use it, and found it quite beneficial. But I also found the ice baths fantastic" - and then I recalled Woody's tolerance for pain.

Rumours were now circulating - that five minutes of cryotherapy can cause your eyeballs to freeze. Any longer and it's kiss goodbye to fatherhood. There was someone else I needed to talk to - the man who introduced Paula Radcliffe to the joys of spending 15 minutes in an ice bath. So I speed-dialled Ger Hartmann.

"Ger, they want me to try out cryotherapy."

"Well, Ian, be careful. Have you got Raynaud's? Ask them about Raynaud's."

"What's that?"

"Well, if you've any circulation problems in your hands and feet, well, you better be careful."

Then I recalled Hartmann's reputation for inflicting pain on the physio table. But the appointment was set, only a child would wimp out now. All I could do was make sure I was properly prepared. I took the bike for a spin over the Sally Gap, did an hour's run in Marlay Park and then tore down the N11.

PJ Long operates the cryotherapy chamber with the thoroughness of a brain surgeon and the ease of a train driver. From the outside, it looks like a giant deep freezer with three small windows and a big walkie-talkie on the front of it. Harmless enough, until Long began to explain the process.

"There are actually three chambers. You'll enter the first chamber, which is minus 10 degrees Celsius. Close that door and move straight into the next one, which is minus 60 degrees Celsius. And keep going into the third chamber, which is minus 110 degrees Celsius, making sure you close the door tightly. I'll be on the intercom counting you through the three minutes.

"And we want you to strip to your running shorts."

What? What about Raynaud's? What about my eyeballs?

"That's ridiculous. I don't know where that came from. There's no way we'd risk that with an elite athlete or anyone else. You do get to wear gloves to protect your hands and wear your runners as normal to protect your feet. You'll also wear a small mask and a head scarf to protect the ears."

There were some other precautions, like a blood pressure test and an inquiry about body piercing but after that it was clothes off and gloves on. For a second I thought of that scene in The Empire Strikes Back where Han Solo gets frozen in carbonite, but I had to concentrate. This was a serious challenge.

Inside chamber one I was shivering. Into chamber two I was shivering and shaking. Into chamber three I was just shaking. The key, Long had said, was to stay relaxed, breathe normally, and walk around in a slow circle. After 30 seconds my arms and legs were stinging. After 60 seconds I could feel my eyelashes freeze. After 90 seconds I could feel my heart jerk and a not-too-pleasant sensation in some other vital organs.

"Two minutes, Ian. Now just relax and I'll count you down . . . 50 seconds."

I could just about hear him. The cold had closed in like a fireball - pardon that expression too but that's what it felt like. I would stick it though. If Ciarán McDonald could . . . "20 seconds . . . 10 seconds . . . okay, head for the door."

The benefits of cryotherapy are instant. They begin with the feeling of being glad to be alive and soon become more specifically sports-related. Once I stopped shivering I could feel a rush of blood through my arms and legs. A rush of energy came with it. It could have been just me but I also felt an intoxicated sense of well-being.

Long took the time to explain it all: "When the body is subjected to such extreme cold it kicks in with a few natural reactions. It thinks it will be subjected to this for a while, and draws as much blood as possible from the extremities, to protect the vital organs. The arteries completely tighten. Nerve endings usually twitch at a rate of 20 times a minute and that increases to between 120 and 140 times a minute. It's all reflex. It does have quite a profound effect on the body.

"One thing most athletes know is that lactic acid inhibits recovery and progress, no matter what the sport. That's what causes tiredness and stiffness in the muscles, say after a game or a heavy session of weights. Cryotherapy is very effective at flushing this away, because the blood flow is coming through all the extremities, all the muscle groups in the body, and back to the vital organs.

"So probably the main benefit is in the recovery from a game or hard training. It's also very effective with muscle strains and allows the physio to work on the area straight away. It won't mend broken bones, but it will help with damage caused to the tissue around it, and is very good as well at reducing swelling."

But why can't a straightforward ice bath produce the same effects? "The coldest you will get an ice bath is around two degrees Celsius. There's no way you could use an ice bath even as remotely as cold as this. It would burn the skin, tear it right off. And ice therapy is limited because it only restricts the blood supply to the area used, and the minute it's taken off the blood goes straight back into the area."

It can take between 15 and 20 sessions of cryotherapy before all the benefits are released. One worked well for me. Heading back up the N11 I noticed the sign for Brittas Bay, and couldn't help myself getting out to run the length of it.

I scarcely felt the old Achilles strain I've been carrying since the Honolulu marathon last December, and when I dived head first in the water afterwards it seemed positively balmy.

And of course Grania has nothing on me anymore.

When hotelier Michael Burke was developing the concept of a health spa during the revamping of Whites's of Wexford he wanted to offer something a little different.

Burke had read about the Irish rugby team visiting the ice chamber at the Olympic training centre at Spala, Poland, and specifically how Brian O'Driscoll and Gordon D'Arcy used it to help heal hamstring injuries during the 2005 Six Nations.

Burke began to make inquiries. The ice chamber - known as cryotherapy - wasn't yet available anywhere in Ireland or Britain. Yet the one in Spala was booked out 18 months in advance. This was exactly the opportunity he'd sought and after some further research and inquiries he sourced his cryotherapy chamber through Spala at a cost of 1.2 million.

Cryotherapy was developed in Japan around 1978. A patented chemical is used to create the extremely low temperatures, and the air also needs to be extremely dry to prevent moisture freezing on the skin. Three minutes is the standard session.

Highly trained elite athletes sometimes go as long as five minutes, but that's the absolute maximum. Any longer than that and there are serious risks.

Since it first opened eight weeks ago the popularity of the chamber has steadily increased. White's offered a test run to several intercounty football and hurling teams, and they quickly returned for more. Players from both Cork and Kilkenny used the chamber in the build-up to the All-Ireland hurling final, Cork forward Niall McCarthy finding it particularly beneficial in easing his asthma symptoms.

In recent weeks several players from the Mayo team, including Ciarán McDonald and Billy Joe Padden, have been arriving down by helicopter ahead of tomorrow's football final. PJ Long, who manages the health spa at White's, couldn't confirm it but there are reports the American golfers - including Tiger Woods - have booked sessions during next week's Ryder Cup.

While the main benefit is faster recovery and increased muscle healing after strenuous exercise (also known as DOMS - delayed-onset muscle soreness), cryotherapy is also said to benefit the treatment of osteoarthritis, sleep disorders, even depression.

Three-minute sessions cost 45.