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Welp, I finally did it. Last night, I spent the first night sleeping in an Altitude Tent. True, it’s simulated altitude, but most studies have concluded that most of the benefits of living at higher altitude can be reaped from simulated altitude.
This is one of those ideas that Ray Peat talked about a lot, and ascribed a lot of benefits to, but that most followers don’t experiment too much with. This is somewhat understandable, as most people don’t want to pack up and move to Denver/Albuquerque/Flagstaff/Mexico City and such, or even higher places like La Paz or various ski resorts.
Peat himself didn’t talk much about the altitude tents, and spoke poorly of them the one time he was asked. But, that was over 10 years ago, and most of the altitude tent setups at the time involved a very small canopy that just went over your head when sleeping. I’d agree, that doesn’t sound that great. The buy in is also fairly expensive, usually around $3-5,000 for a new system. Not outrageous, but not a trivial amount of money for most.
Anyway, I recently found an altitude generator (or hypoxicator, if you prefer) on Ebay for about $300. I jumped at that. I then purchased a new queen size bed tent for about another $300. I might show pictures at some point, but this is a far better setup, IMO, than the canopy. Of note, I believe one altitude tent company rents a setup like this for $600 a month. So, for that rental price, I now have a system that I basically own. Not bad.
Anyway, last night I slept in the tent. The generator makes a bit of noise, but I put it in the closet, which reduced it considerably. I am used to sleeping with white noise, and the noise from the generator wasn’t an issue. I did wake up a few times, and noticed I was hotter and more sweaty than usual. This is pretty common, most people say they get really hot the first night or two, as they get used to sleeping in the tent. This is also likely a good sign, as it indicates that your metabolism is ramping up. Also, since fall starts next week, and temperatures are dropping, it’s probably a good time to test this out.
I plan on giving this a run for at least a month or so, to really see how it plays out. Will update with new info when it comes.
madlad
next start taking ice bath in the morning to stimulate the mitochondria
I’ve been considering that ever since you mentioned it in my cancer thread. I had two concerns though – the first was my wife, and if she could tolerate the noise and inconvenience (or me sleeping in another bed/room) and the second is safety. From what I understand, they remove oxygen to simulate altitude – what safety mechanisms are built in… to avoid not waking up 😉
Please keep us updated on your progress.
This sounds like an interesting experiment @Zack Vegas. I look forward to hearing your results, and some material sourcing to replicate your experiment.
The machines do lower oxygen concentration in the air. I don’t know if “remove” is really the right word, but they basically work by altering the ratios of oxygen and nitrogen. So, the air that’s pumped into the tent has a lower oxygen percentage, and higher nitrogen percentage. The machine I have will only go to 11% Oxygen (which apparently simulates Everest Base Camp, at about 16,000 feet). So, I don’t think there is much, if any, risk of getting airflow with NO oxygen. The tent itself is mostly, but not fully, airtight. So, I think any sort of suffocation risk is overall pretty low (I think there is even a very slight risk of suffocation in a normal bedroom, but really so low it’s basically of no concern). I would think if anything, if the oxygen concentration got too low, you would end up waking in the night really hot and sweaty. That’s happened to me at the lowest oxygen concentration (aka, highest simulated altitude) that I’ve tried so far.
Here’s a college aged athlete who’s been using the tents for years, so this might help alleviate some of the suffocation concerns- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4zIwjbnWNU
As for your concerns with your wife, you’d have to discuss the idea with her. They have king and queen size bed tents, so they are big enough that you could go on this altitude journey together. There are also small canopies, so you could just do it alone, but as Cam Nicholls said in his video, they aren’t that great for romance, and he ended up sleeping in a different bed for the duration of his experiment (the relevant part starts around 5 min)-
Rico Rogers, the former cyclist, used an altitude tent with his wife for a long time, and eventually they did a bedroom conversion, so that would be ideal for a couple, but it’s also the most expensive option, and very permanent.
I think the best option would be to get a big tent and use it as a couple, if your wife is also interested in the idea. The noise of the machine could be an issue, but if you can put it in another room (my current setup), it cuts it down significantly. I’ve been using a white noise machine for a few years now, so any noise that comes from the other room isn’t an issue.
This week, I seem to have adapted to sleeping in the tent. I have it set to about 13% Oxygen (which suggests that the air in the tent would be more like 14%), which is similar to adding 10-12,000 feet of altitude. Going with the lower number, and adding it to the altitude that I’m at (roughly 2,400 feet), it should be close to sleeping at 12,000 feet altitude, which is the altitude of La Paz.
The first two weeks, I often didn’t make it all the way through the night, often times turning the machine off after about 4 hours or so. The past few nights, I’ve pretty much slept 8 hours in the tent. I do think it’s still raising metabolism and such, but not as drastic as the first couple nights. So, if anyone else tries this, there does seem to be an adjustment period, which is something I’ve heard others speak about. It’s also continued to be very hot where I am (over 100 during the day, 70-80 for the low at night), so that might have been a factor, too. I thought it would be mostly cooling down, but the Sonoran Desert had other ideas.
I think the best way to apply this is to scour Ebay. Altitude Generators do pop up every couple weeks or so, sometimes in that $500 price range. I just saw one in the past few weeks from a company I hadn’t heard of before, right in that range, but it appears to have sold.
I just got my first power bill since starting to use the tent, and it was a pleasant surprise. From some very basic (and potentially off) calculations based on power consumption estimates, it seemed like the generator consumed about one third or one forth the power of a central AC unit for a one bedroom apartment, on an hour to hour runtime comparison. But, AC units generally don’t run for 8 hours straight at a time (at least in apartments). At any rate, I thought the generator might use roughly half the monthly power, or a little more, than my AC in my Sonoran Desert apartment (there were still 100+ degree days early this week). So, I was thinking maybe the bill might be 30-40 dollars more than my previous bill.
So, I was pleasantly surprised when my power bill was actually 5 dollars lower than the previous month. That month was the highest of all electric bills since I moved here about 5 months ago, but even then, was only about 20 dollars higher than previous bills. I didn’t think I was using the AC that much less (maybe I was). But, it’s also possible that I was using more power, but it was very cheap, overnight power.
Many of those nights I only used it for half the night as well (like, 3-5 hours), so that could be a factor, too. But, it would be a good guess to suspect that one of those generators is going to cost somewhere between 25-50 bucks a month to run every night for roughly 8 hours. Maybe more if you’re in an area that is really trying to “fight climate change” or “reduce their carbon footprint,” because those things directly translate to higher prices for gas and electricity.
I just got a pulse oximeter, and tried it out a few times. During the day, it registered 96-97%. I took it in the altitude tent, and after sleeping in the tent all night, tried it out when I first woke up. It read 90%.
I remember Ray Peat suggesting that 99 or 100% was not actually a great reading, as that indicated that oxygen wasn’t actually being delivered to tissues. These readings seem to be generally positive, and the lower reading after spending the night in the tent does indicate that tissues are getting more oxygen with the simulated altitude, and also that more CO2 is being retained in the body.
It’s going great. I did actually buy a newer generator off Aliexpress (which is the Hacenor brand, and probably the same core unit as Higher Peak’s Mag-30). The volume of air the new machine puts out is much larger than the older one, in a similar time frame. It can also go to a much lower percentage of oxygen on the highest setting, about 8.5%, which is the equivalent of 6,700 meters, or 22,000 feet.
I also purchased an oxygen sensor. At the setting I’m currently at, it’s lowering to 15% oxygen in the tent overnight, which is equivalent to about 2700 meters or 9000 feet. Pulse Oxymeter ratings can vary, but I’ve seen them dip into the 80s often, usually higher 80s. One time, I got a reading in the 70s. However, I can vary from finger to finger, and I’ve seen ratings vary by 5-10% in the span within a minute, so not sure how accurate those things are. But, the trend in the tent is always lower than regular air.
The altitude is supposed to be added to your current altitude, so that suggests I am sleeping at an equivalent of 11,500 feet (since I live at about 2400 feet elevation), almost La Paz. They suggest sleeping at no more than 4000 meters (13,000 feet), as most people start to have sleep disrupted a lot going higher than that. I have tried to go higher than my current setting, but I did have some issues sleeping through the night, so figured I might need to wait a bit longer before trying to go higher.
One interesting thing, I’ve noticed that the lower oxygen/higher nitrogen air smells somewhat sweet. That’s the best way to describe it. Certainly pleasant, and fresh as well.
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