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I tried out the hyperbaric chamber therapy the USMNT uses for World Cup recovery

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LAGUNA HILLS, Calif. — Strapping into a hyperbaric oxygen chamber is a unique experience for the average person.

Approaching a windowed, enclosed tube with an oxygen mask dangling and a timer set to one hour on top of the contraption may feel daunting, but hey, there’s a friendly pair of hands to guide you and a TV on the other side of the glass to soothe your attention span.

Laying down on the bed, in some ways, you feel like you’re heading into a more comfortable MRI machine. With a more overactive imagination, perhaps you feel like an astronaut.

At any rate, it is not a normal part of someone’s day — unless you’re a world-class athlete. Then, it’s what is rapidly becoming a typical part of recovery, using cutting edge technology and every available resource to aid performance. It’s especially popular among ultimate sporting age-defiers like Tom Brady, LeBron James and Cristiano Ronaldo.

At this World Cup, the U.S. men’s national team is utilizing hyperbaric oxygen therapy as part of its recovery, with the team’s base camp in Southern California featuring the same kind of equipment.

“If a player has got any injuries, this is going to shorten their recovery time,” Carol Manning, founder and CEO of Hyperbaric Lab, told The Athletic. “At minimum, 30-35%, they’ll heal faster. If it’s just to rebuild, restore and recover … they’re going to see a 50% increase in stamina and reaction time. I would say you really need to do it three times a week if you’re a pro athlete.”

Manning, whose facility is a short drive from the team’s group stage base, says she hosted U.S. midfielder Sebastian Berhalter and another teammate early in camp. She regularly sees high level youth and college athletes, as well as a professional MMA fighter, among other clients.

The point of hyperbaric oxygen therapy, basically, is to supercharge blood with oxygen. The user breathes in pure oxygen from the mask inside a pressurized chamber, allowing it to flow directly to inflamed areas of the body for enhanced healing.

For athletes, this vastly accelerates recovery from both high output events (like a game) and injuries. At this particular lab, red light and laser therapy is used in conjunction with oxygen therapy.

“They’re hugely important,” non-thermal laser therapy specialist Dr. Kirk Gair said. “Athletes are always looking for ways to increase ATP (a human cell’s main energy molecule) and both the laser therapy and hyperbaric oxygen use that. Especially in soccer, you need endurance. When you’re in a tournament and you’ve got all these games in succession, you need enhanced recovery.”

Last week, ahead of the USMNT’s final group game against Turkey, I got to experience this high-level equipment at Hyperbaric Lab in Laguna Hills and got an explainer on the advantages this, red light therapy and laser therapy can provide to athletes.

Sitting in the chamber with no phone or modern distractions beyond a TV on the other side of the glass, an hour passed surprisingly quickly. It’s pleasant, too, once your ears pop, like on an airplane. A little light headedness was the only immediate side effect for a first-timer, but that quickly subsided. I tested out my lung capacity with a quick run and, still no professional athlete, anecdotally at least I can say I felt better than the run I went on the day prior.

Dr. Gair likens laser therapy to how babies born with jaundice get put under blue light to help their livers and how humans get vitamin D from UV light. He uses Class 2, non-thermal lasers in different colors — violet, green and red — that trigger different reactions. on the body, each color triggers different reactions.