WADA reviewed it and said it violates the spirit of sport. That should tell you everything you need to know.

The Short Version
– CVAC cycles barometric pressure and temperature around your body, training your cardiovascular system to capture and use oxygen more efficiently at the cellular level.
– Stanford documented a 20% increase in peak power output. The University of Hawaii showed a 5%+ increase in VO2 max in eight weeks. WADA said it violates the spirit of sport.
– There are only 22 CVAC locations in the world. Axxiom in Greenwood Village has one of them.
– Paired with the Kineo for strength, CVAC completes the vitality equation: Strength + VO2 Max = Vitality.
– It’s not just for athletes: improved oxygen efficiency benefits executives, active adults, and anyone who refuses to accept decline.

There are 22 CVAC locations in the world. Not 22 thousand. Twenty-two. Novak Djokovic used it. An Ironman world champion won his title at 63 using it. The World Anti-Doping Agency looked at it, couldn’t ban it because there’s nothing to detect in your blood, but publicly stated it violates the spirit of sport. And for athletes in Denver looking for every edge, this is the kind of athlete recovery technology that changes what’s possible.

When the organization that polices performance enhancement says a device gives too much of an advantage, that’s not a red flag. That’s a signal. And one of those 22 locations is right here in Greenwood Village, Colorado.

What Does CVAC Actually Do for Athletes in Denver?

CVAC stands for Cyclic Variations in Adaptive Conditioning. You sit in a pod. The pod cycles barometric pressure and temperature around your body in rhythmic patterns. You’re breathing the same air you’d breathe anywhere else, 21% oxygen. What changes is how much oxygen is available per breath as the pressure shifts.

Your body has to adapt in real time. Your cardiovascular system responds. Your red blood cells become more efficient carriers. Your mitochondria, the power plants inside every cell, get better at converting oxygen into energy. Your lymphatic system, which doesn’t have its own pump, gets moved by the pressure changes. Inflammation clears. Recovery accelerates.

The result is a measurable improvement in your body’s ability to use oxygen. And oxygen is the single most essential resource every system in your body depends on.

Think about what that means at the cellular level. Every tissue in your body, from your brain to your muscles to your organs, runs on oxygen. When your body gets better at capturing, transporting, and utilizing oxygen, everything downstream improves. Your muscles recover faster. Your brain functions more clearly. Your immune system responds more efficiently. Your sleep deepens because the metabolic processes that drive restoration run on oxygen too. CVAC doesn’t target one system. It improves the fuel supply that powers all of them.

What Are the Research-Backed Results of CVAC?

This isn’t anecdotal. The research exists.

Stanford University documented a 20% increase in peak power output in subjects using CVAC. That’s not a marginal gain. In the world of athletic performance, 20% is transformative.

The University of Hawaii showed a greater than 5% increase in VO2 max in just eight weeks of CVAC sessions. VO2 max is the gold standard measure of cardiovascular fitness and the most correlated biomarker with lifespan. Improving it by 5% in eight weeks, passively, without exercise, changes the math on what’s possible.

And then there’s the WADA situation. WADA couldn’t detect anything in the blood of CVAC users because the technology doesn’t introduce a substance. It trains your body to be better at what it already does. They acknowledged this publicly and said it violates the spirit of sport. The implication was clear: CVAC works so well that using it feels like cheating.

To put the VO2 max number in perspective, research has shown that every 1 mL/kg/min increase in VO2 max is associated with roughly a 9% decrease in cardiovascular mortality risk. A 5% increase in VO2 max in eight weeks isn’t a marginal lifestyle upgrade. For someone in their 40s, 50s, or 60s, it’s a meaningful shift in longevity trajectory. And it happens while you’re sitting in a pod for 20 minutes.

Who Uses CVAC and Why?

Djokovic is arguably the greatest tennis player of all time. He didn’t get there by accident, and he didn’t use CVAC because it was trendy. He used it because his team identified it as one of the most effective conditioning tools available.

Lew Hollander became the oldest Ironman world champion at 63. He used CVAC as part of his preparation. At an age when most people are slowing down, he was competing at the highest level of endurance sport on the planet. That’s not genetics. That’s a system.

For athletes in Denver and along the Front Range, CVAC addresses something that altitude training alone cannot. At 5,280 feet, you already have 17% less oxygen per breath than at sea level. Your body has adapted to that baseline, which means traditional altitude exposure isn’t giving you the same edge it gives someone who flies in from the coast. CVAC goes deeper. It trains the systems responsible for oxygen capture and utilization at the cellular level, so your body extracts more from every breath regardless of elevation. This is altitude training on the Front Range taken to a completely different level.

What Does a CVAC Session Feel Like?

People always ask this, and the answer surprises them. You sit in the pod. The door closes. And then you feel the pressure shift. Your ears may pop slightly, the way they do on an airplane. The pressure rises and falls in rhythmic cycles, and the temperature shifts with it. Some people describe a gentle pulling sensation. Others just feel a rhythmic pulsing around their body.

You’re not exerting. You’re not sweating. You’re sitting. But inside your body, everything is responding. Your cardiovascular system is being trained by the pressure changes. Your lymphatic fluid is being moved through pathways it normally needs muscle contraction to travel. Your red blood cells are adapting to fluctuating oxygen availability.

Twenty minutes later, the session ends. Most people report feeling lighter, clearer, and more energized. That’s not placebo. That’s improved oxygen delivery reaching your brain and muscles in real time.

Over weeks of consistent sessions, the effects deepen. Your body doesn’t just respond to the stimulus during the session. It adapts. It gets permanently better at doing what the CVAC is training it to do. That’s the compounding effect. Each session builds on the last, and the gains accumulate.

How Do CVAC and Kineo Create the Ultimate Performance Stack?

For athletes in Colorado, CVAC pairs with strength training on the Kineo to create something that doesn’t exist anywhere else. The Kineo builds raw strength through intelligent eccentric loading. Your muscles handle 40 to 80 percent more load on the way down, triggering fast-twitch fiber recruitment and adaptation that traditional weights miss. CVAC then accelerates the recovery process, so your body adapts faster between sessions.

Strength plus oxygen efficiency. That’s the equation. The Kineo gives you the force output. CVAC gives you the engine to sustain it. Together, they compound.

Every session is private, one-on-one with an expert trainer. Every rep is tracked. Every adaptation is measured on the InBody 970S, a medical-grade body composition scanner that shows your muscle mass by segment, visceral fat, cellular health, and inflammation markers. You can see, in real numbers, what your body is doing in response to the CVAC and Kineo stimulus over time. This is athlete recovery technology and performance conditioning built into a single system, available through personal training in Denver at Axxiom.

Is CVAC Only for Athletes?

CVAC isn’t only for competitive athletes. The benefits of improved oxygen efficiency, reduced inflammation, and accelerated recovery apply to everyone. An executive who sits in meetings all day and sleeps poorly on business trips benefits from better oxygen delivery to the brain and deeper recovery cycles. A parent who chases kids on the weekend and hikes on vacation benefits from a cardiovascular system that doesn’t redline at moderate altitude. A 55-year-old in south Denver who wants to stay independent and capable benefits from the mitochondrial efficiency and inflammatory reduction that CVAC produces.

The formula that the leading researchers agree on is simple: Strength + VO2 Max = Vitality. CVAC is the most effective tool we’ve found for the VO2 max side of that equation. And when you combine it with the Kineo for strength and the InBody 970S for measurement, you have a complete system that builds vitality across every dimension that matters.

We accept HSA because this is a health investment, not a luxury. Twenty minutes in the pod, once per week, is a commitment that fits into any schedule and produces returns that compound over months and years.

There Are 22 CVAC Locations in the World. One Is in Greenwood Village.

There’s a reason most people have never heard of CVAC. It’s not marketed on Instagram. It’s not in franchise gyms. It exists in 22 locations globally because the technology is rare, the machines are expensive, and the operators need to understand the science behind it.

We have one. It’s in Greenwood Village at 5425 Landmark Place, Suite 308, in the Denver Tech Center, and it’s available to anyone serious about their performance, their recovery, and their vitality. Whether you’re a competitive athlete on the Front Range looking for an edge, an executive who wants to age with strength and capability, or someone who simply refuses to accept decline as inevitable, CVAC is the tool that changes the equation.

If you want to see what CVAC can do for your training, your recovery, and your vitality, book a session at axxiomsv.com.

Axxiom Strength + Vitality is a private vitality studio in Greenwood Village, CO. Colorado’s first data-driven vitality system. We combine private strength training on the Kineo Intelligent Load System with CVAC adaptive conditioning and InBody 970S body composition analysis. Book your intro session at axxiomsv.com.