Good Swimming Workout

For everyone interested in breaking out of a normal gym or run routine I have a good swimming workout that will tire you out pretty good. I kind of stole this from my old high school swimming teacher and it requires knowledge of some pretty basic strokes but it is a good alternative to normal stuff. So, here it is.

Start out in a basic 25 meter pool, and swim the following circuit as many times as you can in 30 minutes with no breaks (if you think you're going to drown then by all means take a break.) For future reference, a lap is swimming to the far wall and back.

Lap 1, front stroke then a relaxing survival backstroke
Lap 2, breast stroke, side stroke
Lap 3, back stroke, survival back stroke

The concept is to get in a good distance swim while regulating your heart rate and breathing. When you do the first half of a lap you are doing a race stroke so you are pushing yourself (50-75 percent of full speed if you're motivated.) The second half is a rest stroke, during which you are trying to relax your breathing and heart rate. During the last 5-10 minutes, try to bump up the intensity of your workout so you finish as many sets as possible.

Difficulty can be modified to swimming experience. For example, you could only swim 15 minutes and still get a decent workout in if you pushed yourself. So, there you have it. Today, I also found that this exercise is a great way to develop patience for meditation. Instead of focusing on the time you are at, you just focus on swimming the circuit. This applies to meditation because when you meditate you aren't doing it to pass the time, so why would you focus solely on the clock?

Got any advice for people who are terrible at swimming and practically die of exhaustion after 2 lengths? :blush:

V-Tog wrote: Got any advice for people who are terrible at swimming and practically die of exhaustion after 2 lengths? :blush:

Yeah, wear floaties :woohoo: j/k

It's something that takes time to build up to...run and do cardio to build up your stamina....when swimming take your time until the strokes come naturally, then you can pick up the pace....

Reading over that...it sounds kinda pervy...or maybe its just me :blush:

It is my understanding that swimming, as an exercise, is actually one of the best ones to perform (muscle-specific exercises not withstanding). I believe it uses the greatest amount of muscle groups (and so good overall performance) than any other sport. That is what I remember however I get scared of being submerged in water and can't hold my breath while swimming longer than 10 seconds so don't take my word for it

Scared of being submerged?....lol then you don't want to go through "drown proofing"...of course that sort of fear is a great motivator for it....

For those that don't know drown proofing is when they tie your hands behind your back, tie your feet together, and toss you in the water, you then have to swim to the surface...it's very hard and you have to keep resurfacing if you don't want to drown.....

Having said that I must emphasize DO NOT ATTEMPT THIS ON YOUR OWN, OR WITHOUT PROPERLY TRAINED PERSONEL AT STANDBY

RyuJin wrote: For those that don't know drown proofing is when they tie your hands behind your back, tie your feet together, and toss you in the water, you then have to swim to the surface...it's very hard and you have to keep resurfacing if you don't want to drown.....

:ohmy: :ohmy: :ohmy:

What kind of a person would come up with that idea??? :laugh:

RyuJin wrote: It's something that takes time to build up to...run and do cardio to build up your stamina....when swimming take your time until the strokes come naturally, then you can pick up the pace....

Thing with me is that I can do the strokes perfectly fine, and I've always been pretty sporty and had a lot of both strength and stamina...I just can't swim very far without feeling as though I'm going to have a heart attack (and can't tread water for more than 10-20 seconds either).

As I'm relatively fit it must be something technique-based, only I don't think my technique looks obviously bad...it's a bit annoying actually, as I want to know what I'm doing wrong! :laugh:

Lol...drown proofing is a special forces thing..seals, force recon, sas, etc...

I'm ex navy, we all had to pass a swim test and aquatic survival...making floatation devices out of our pants, shirts, sea bags, etc...I almost qualified for seals on my first test...failed the 500 meter swim by only a few seconds...mainly due to technique...I had never learned to frog kick....guess what I know how to do now :laugh: and I can use it without a sound or splash...which is the purpose... it's very likely if you change your technique you'll be able to swim faster, further, and use less energy... I can tread water for nearly an hour with little effort due to technique...

RyuJin wrote: Having said that I must emphasize DO NOT ATTEMPT THIS ON YOUR OWN, OR WITHOUT PROPERLY TRAINED PERSONEL AT STANDBY

^^ Seconded/bolded/underlined/shouted; lots of even strong, experienced swimmers drown (as in dead) by trying to hold their breath under water for fun or training. See Shallow Water Blackout .

V-Tog wrote: As I'm relatively fit it must be something technique-based, only I don't think my technique looks obviously bad...it's a bit annoying actually, as I want to know what I'm doing wrong! :laugh:

I have the same problem with freestyle. Otherwise I love the water, especially being underneath it - but not so much for exercise as it takes ages to wear myself out, and freestyle seems to target strange muscle groups for me.

The only thing that sort of helped me in freestyle was to focus on getting a massive breath and holding it in the upper chest as buoyancy, exhaling just before your next inhalation. Then, with that upper chest buoyancy, really rolling onto my side during the reach. The head when shoulders are horizontal is at water level, but if you roll your upper body to the side with shoulders being vertically aligned, that upper body buoyancy means you head might get a bit higher out of the water naturally. Otherwise I just sort of feel like a flailing, flapping sinking brick!!

Yeah that shallow water blackout is no joke...

The hardest swim I ever made was actually as a civilian...a mile and a half up river carrying 2 filled scuba tanks..me and a couple of friends were going scuba diving at a place near where I live called hospital hole...we didn't have a boat to take our gear up river, so we put our fins on and swam carrying the tanks...hardest swim ever...

We didn't want to waste our tanks on the swim there as the site is so deep that only nitrox divers can hope to reach the bottom...and we wanted to explore some of the hole...

Just swim 3km. alternate styles and speed. always go for technique, not for brute force for a good workout. Never "rest", choose to swim slow instead (most relaxing if you really need it is on your back arms doing the equivalent of butterfly, feet doing what they should for breast stroke). To increase red cell count, do some breath-hold swimming.

For this, don't hyperventilate, don't use tools, nothing. just swim underwater until you "run out", don't push it though, once you resurface simply keep on swimming and breathing at a normal interval. swim very slowly so as to recuperate. don't take a break. as soon as you're good to go again, do so. Keep training like this (can easily do an hour a day) and you'll dramatically improve very quickly. I used to be able to swim series of 50 metres with no recuperation, just air out, back in, good for another 50. This for an hour. (I was a smoker at the time)