Tuira 6.20. Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Twenty past six in the morning. Into the ice hole.
And the sauna? Finnish news put it simply: the winter swimmers don't miss a sauna. The world sells the cold plunge as the dessert after the sauna. Here, it is breakfast.
In 2020, about one adult Finn in eight dipped in an ice hole. Twice as many as in 2000. Finland's own lab studies, in Oulu, used twenty seconds.
So what did they find? The swimmers said they felt better. But one of their papers wrote: "No clear effect of winter swimming as such was detected."
An Oulu swimmer explains it anyway: after the ice hole, the body warms itself. And the feeling is just brilliant. Tuira 6.20. Sauna optional.
Never swim alone. Don't jump in. (Suomen Latu's winter swimming rules.)
The film is paper cut-outs, our own drawings: the sign, the phone's page and the café card are pictures, not photographs of real ones.
Sources: Yle, Kimmo Hiltula, 27 Feb 2026 (Oulu's Tuira 620 group meets Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 6.20; "Saunaa talviuimarit eivät kaipaa"; Antti Karppinen: "keho lämmittää itsensä ja olohan on aivan loistava uinnin jälkeen"); Neuvonen et al. 2022, Luonnon virkistyskäyttö 2020, Luke, p. 38-39 (11.8 % of Finns aged 15-80 dipped in 2020, 5.9 % in 2000; Luke notes the media attention may have raised the 2020 figure); Leppäluoto et al. 2008, Scand J Clin Lab Invest (20 s in 0-2 °C water); Huttunen et al. 2001, Int J Circumpolar Health (mean immersion 36 s); Huttunen et al. 2004, Int J Circumpolar Health (swimmers reported better well-being; self-report, not randomised); Hirvonen et al. 2002, Int J Circumpolar Health ("No clear effect of winter swimming as such was detected"; blood pressure fell in the controls too). The sign in the film is illustrative.
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