Your first recovery session: what actually happens

Most of the nerves people have about a first recovery session are not about the cold. They are about not knowing where to park, what to wear, whether they will look like they have never done this before, and what happens if they hate it.

So here is the whole thing, start to finish.

Before you arrive

Book online. If you have bought a combination package or the Experience Pass, you book each therapy in it separately and put them back to back in the same afternoon. That trips people up the first time: buying the package is not the same as having a time.

Bring togs if contrast therapy or the rooftop is in your booking. For PEMF, red light and compression you stay dressed, so there is nothing to bring at all. Water and towels are here.

Getting in the door

We are at 1 Tennis Lane in Parnell, off Stanley Street beside the Manuka Tennis Arena. Park in the underground carpark below the building.

Renew is inside the Next Gen building. Walk in the main entrance and tell reception you are here for Renew. Next Gen is a separate business and you do not need to be a member of it, or of anything.

Give yourself a few extra minutes the first time. There is a short induction before your session starts, so arriving early is better than arriving on the dot.

What each one is like

• Contrast therapy. Sauna, then cold plunge, then repeat. You set the pace and the number of rounds. Nobody is timing you.
• PEMF. Lie down fully clothed for thirty minutes. You feel the pulses, most where you are already tight. Most people doze off.
• Red light. Twenty minutes between two panels, eye shields on. Warm at most. Nothing dramatic happens, which is the honest version.
• Compression. Thirty minutes with sleeves on your legs, hips or arms, inflating in a wave. Firm, never painful, clothes on.
• Massage. Undressed to your own comfort, covered by a towel except the area being worked on. Say what you want out of the hour at the start.

The things nobody tells you

You do not have to get in the ice bath. Plenty of people do their first session as sauna only and add the cold on the second or third visit. The sauna on its own is still a good hour.

The cold gets easier fast. Not gradually, and not over months. The second plunge is noticeably easier than the first, usually in the same session.

Order matters a bit. Heat before massage, because warm muscle gives more. Compression last, because everything else has been getting circulation moving and that is the one that clears it through.

You will probably sleep well. It is the most common thing people report after a first visit, and it usually happens that night.

How long to allow

A single session is 20 to 30 minutes plus changing. All four combination therapies back to back is about two hours. A massage is 60 or 90 minutes on its own.

If you are not sure what to book

The Experience Pass is two weeks of unlimited contrast therapy, rooftop contrast, PEMF, red light and compression for $160, one per client. It exists precisely so you can work out what you actually like before committing to anything. Most people find one therapy they did not expect to care about.

If you would rather ask a human first, get in touch.