Want to start swimming for fitness? Go for it! This low-impact exercise offers countless mental and physical benefits, including full body muscle endurance, cardiovascular endurance, core strength and flexibility without the risk of injury associated with high-impact exercises. Staring at a black line for an hour may seem boring, but it doesn’t have to be. With four different strokes and limitless practice variations, you never have to do the same workout twice!
Getting through the first practice is the hardest part. Even if you are in good shape on land, it will take a few practices for your body to adapt to exercising in the water. After only a handful of practices, you will see a huge improvement in your swimming. Tracking your heart rate is a great way to monitor your swimming improvement within each workout, and over time.
Here are some tips to help you get started:
The proper etiquette for sharing a lane with more than one person is to circle swim, which means to swim in a counter clockwise circle. If you are only swimming with one other person, you can decide either to split the lane or circle swim.
Swim Workout Structure
- Warm-up: The warm-up is used to get your body ready to do the main work of the practice; this will mainly consist of swimming, but can be complemented with dynamic stretching.
- Main workout: The main workout is where the hardest work will be done.
- Cooldown: The cooldown at the end is used to bring your heart rate back down. The cooldown should start at a moderate pace and move to a slower pace.
Try the workouts below to get started:
Workout 1: Get comfortable with the water
Warm-up:
- Swim 5–10 minutes of freestyle laps
- Start off easy, building to a faster pace
Main Set:
- Kick for 2 minutes
- Rest for 2 minutes
- Pull for 2 minutes
- Rest for 2 minutes
- Swim for 5 minutes: Start off easy, building to a faster pace
- Rest for 2 minutes
- Tread water for 2 minutes
Cooldown:
- Swim 5–10 minutes of freestyle or backstroke laps
- Start at a moderate speed; slowly decrease to easy
After you have mastered the techniques in the first workout, move on to workout 2; it incorporates a little bit of speed work.
Workout 2: Swim a little bit faster
Warm-up:
- Swim 5–10 minutes of freestyle laps
- Start off easy, building to a faster pace
- Rest for 1 minute
- Kick for 2 minutes
- Rest for 1 minute
- Pull for 2 minutes
Main Set:
- Swim for 5 minutes
- Start off easy, building to a faster pace
- Rest for 2 minutes
- Swim 2–4 x 1 length of the pool at maximum effort
- Rest 1 minute between each length
- Tread water for 2 minutes
Cooldown:
- Swim 5–10 minutes of freestyle laps
- Start at a moderate speed; slowly decrease to easy
Swimming Terms
1. Kick: Keeping your legs straight, alternately move them up and down rapidly in the water without using your arms. Isolate your legs by using a kick board or putting your hands in a streamlined position.
2. Pull: Use only your arms to move yourself through the water. You may put a pull buoy between your legs to help isolate your arms and keep you hips afloat.
3. Treading Water: Keep your head above water while in a vertical position.