Sweat Power: Why the Sauna is a Popular Recovery Tactic for NHL Players

The Dallas Stars landed in Helsinki, Finland, a few hours later than expected after a flight delay before the start of their Global Series trip last week. That meant the training they had initially planned was canceled. Instead, the team went straight to enjoying one of Finland’s proudest institutions: the sauna.

This has become part of the routine for teams traveling to Finland to play in the Global Series. The Finns on the roster want to give their teammates a taste of what life is like in their home country. The experience of a Finnish sauna is unlike anything you will find in the United States. But the sauna itself is no stranger to many NHL players.

“It’s growing a lot,” said Finnish Stars defender Esa Lindell. “I feel like even within our team it’s used by so many guys. Even on other road trips, guys look for places to recover on their days off.

Last season the sauna was a regular part of the Stars road trips. They went to an indoor/outdoor sauna/cold dip in Montreal during their day off there. And usually it’s goalkeeper Jake Oettinger, an American, who researches where to find one when the team travels. So this was a group that was well aware of the benefits before they left for Finland.

All smiles and saunas for the @DallasStars players #NHLGlobalSeries 🇫🇮 pic.twitter.com/z74wEpScgu

— NHLPA (@NHLPA) October 29, 2024

Maple Leafs defenseman Jani Hakanpää, who played three seasons with the Stars, noticed a change even from the moment he started playing in Dallas. When he started playing there, the Finns and Russians were in the sauna, but not many other players. By the time he left, it felt like half the team was there.

“As a Finn you think: ‘Well, we’ve been doing this all our lives. We already know it’s a good thing!’” Hakanpää said.

Part of the change is the growing research into the benefits of sauna use for both elite athletes and the general population. NHLers usually opt for the dry sauna, which is typically heated somewhere between 150 and 200 degrees Fahrenheit. The lack of humidity makes the heat more bearable. According to studiesBathing in the sauna four to seven times a week reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease, reduces the risk of neurodegenerative diseases and leads to a decrease in mortality from all causes.

But NHL players are among the fittest people in the population. They don’t necessarily think about their mortality when they enter the sauna. However, they are concerned about their longevity over the course of a season and their career. Some studies even show an increase in cardiovascular function with regular sauna use after exercise.

Ed Gannon, Sabres’ director of physical performance and head strength coach, said he views the sauna as an effective “microstrategy” for recovery, with the pillars of recovery being good nutrition and a good night’s sleep. The NHL plays games so often that any strategy a player can use to gain an edge is useful.

“The idea of ​​the sauna, there’s some research behind it that it can increase blood flow, the heat causes vasodilation and blood flow increases so you can flush out toxins after competitions or a little bit faster,” Gannon said. “What a lot of players will do is transition between cold baths and saunas. The sauna also has a feel-good factor. When you are between matches, it is nice to regenerate mentally and physically.”

Last season, the Sabers signed veteran defenseman Erik Johnson, in part because his wisdom would be valuable to the league’s youngest team. One of Johnson’s first tips for Rasmus Dahlin was that he should buy a sauna for the house he bought. Dahlin followed the advice of the man with a Stanley Cup ring who is just a few NHL games short of 1,000. Dahlin’s outdoor barrel sauna, along with the cold bath, has become part of his nightly routine. He was fourth in the NHL in time on ice last season and missed just one game. Dahlin’s sauna has also become a fixture at team parties because it is large enough for a group.

“You feel incredible afterwards,” Dahlin said.

Johnson first came to terms with the idea of ​​using the sauna while working with Nathan MacKinnon’s trainer, Marcin Goszczynski, in Colorado. MacKinnon’s fitness and nutrition habits are legendary in league circles, so his teammates wanted all the tips they could get.

“After the game, after practice, on a day off, those can be a huge boost for recovery and for your immune system and all that,” Johnson said. “He was the first one to really push that on us and then I would say eight of us probably had saunas in our homes in Colorado.”

Gannon is quick to point out that not every player will use the same recovery strategies. The Sabers have a large sign in their weight room that lists the symptoms a player may be feeling and the proper recovery strategies for that system are listed below. The most important thing for Gannon is that every player has some kind of recovery routine. He doesn’t want players to just play a game and leave the rink.

That’s part of the appeal of the sauna. For many, it helps them fall asleep faster after a race, which is crucial for athletes in addition to diet. But playing in the NHL is not about optimizing sleep quality.

“The challenge with hockey players is they play at night,” Gannon said. “They take caffeine before the game and they take carbohydrates and simple sugars and you have the energy and the excitement of the game itself.

“The sauna can be part of that. I think you’ve heard in many sleep hygiene studies in the general population that you should take a hot shower before going to bed. The sauna acts like that. The heat of the sauna causes the parasympathetic nervous system to take over a little more, which can help the players relax. It’s a great strategy to bring them back after the game, increase blood flow and improve waste removal.

But as Gannon noted, not every player has the same recovery routine. Sabers forward Zach Benson discovered he loved mobility work and the hot tub. Benson lived with Dahlin as a rookie last season, but didn’t go to the backyard sauna often.

“I’m not going in there,” Benson said. “I’m afraid of those things. Too hot. I love hot tubs and only hot tubs. It does have a hot tub, but it is covered in the winter. I don’t do cold diving either. Usually I just go in the hot tub here. I don’t want to recover too much. I have no problem sleeping. I probably would if I had trouble sleeping, but I have a problem with too much sleep.”

Sabers goalie Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen laughed when the subject of sauna popularity came up. He and fellow Finn Henri Jokiharju joke about rushing into the sauna after training. The rest of the league is catching up to what the Finns have always known.

“In the past, in Finland, people gave birth in saunas, so some people were born in saunas,” Luukkonen said. “I wasn’t born in the sauna, but I assume I was very young.”

Having a sauna at your home in North America is seen as a luxury. In Finland it is common. And facilities like the ones the Stars and Florida Panthers visited last week can be found all over Finland. The experience is similar to a golf club in the United States, where people socialize and enjoy meals between sauna sessions.

“I remember we always went to the sauna on Saturday evenings and the whole family was there, me, my mom and dad and my sister,” Hakanpää said. “It was a weekly thing, every Saturday. And next summer, when I’m at my grandparents’ house, it would happen more often. You swam in the lake and then went to the sauna. It’s been part of my life since I was a little kid. And it still is. It’s nice to come home in the summer when we have one. We will probably use it four times a week.”

Using sauna and cold immersion together is the preferred tactic for many NHLers. Johnson said he would go to the sauna for 15 or 20 minutes and then do three minutes of cold immersion and repeat the cycle three times. Some players only use the sauna on practice days, but others use it more often. When Stars defenseman Ilya Lyubushkin played in Buffalo, he had a barrel sauna in his backyard. He would go in at night after the games and lie in the snow bank as his cold soak. One of Hakanpää’s favorite parts of the sauna is the way he is forced to disconnect.

“You just have to sit there with your teammates,” he said. “There are so many aspects. Obviously the physical part, but also the mental part. Even if you are there alone. It is nice and quiet there and you have time to think about what happened.”

Gannon sees this as a continuation of the modern athlete who increasingly focuses on training, nutrition and recovery. He always puts Sabers players through a light workout when they land for a road trip. Now he sees players using hotel spa facilities for extra recovery. Johnson has been in the league since 2007, so he has seen that changing mentality firsthand.

“I would say the biggest difference is when I came into the league, the guys would just take a case of beer into the sauna, drink beer and sit there,” Johnson said. “Now there is some of that, but not to the extent it used to be. It is always in the culture.”

(Illustration by Dan Goldfarb / The Athletics; photos: Eliot J. Schechter/Getty, Patrick McDermott/NHLI and iStock)