Cardio: The Swimming Workout
A lot of people don’t realize that swimming is an “aerobic” or “cardio” type exercise. Cardio has a reputation for helping your body to burn fat without bulking up in muscle and is excellent for improving heart health.
You will utilize many different strokes and swimming styles in the swimming workout. You will work numerous different muscles and it will also mix up the workout somewhat. You will use three alternate strokes, although you can incorporate your favorite stroke if you wish. Just make sure you change up your routine every now and again to improve your results.
Before we actually start the workout, make sure that you warm up first to prevent injury. ?Do each of the following strokes at a ‘jog-like’ speed for two minutes each (for a total of six minutes) before starting the actual workout.
The first stroke is the butterfly. Do twenty strokes as fast as you can and then do ten more strokes at a relaxed speed. Then move onto the next kind of stroke, freestyle.
This will be the second kind of stroke. ?Freestyle for 30 quick strokes at your fastest speed before doing 10 more relaxed freestyle strokes. The next stroke is known as the “breaststroke” style.
Out of all these strokes, the breast stroke takes the most out of you. Breaststroke for 20 quick strokes at your quickest speed before doing 10 more at a relaxed pace.
These three strokes make up a cycle, do eight cycles. I recommend that you start with only doing four cycles and build your way up to eight cycles. If you can, increase the workout by 1 cycle each time you workout until are able to easily do 8 full cycles.
When you reach this point of the?swimming workout you can add to the workout intensity by doing more fast strokes during each stroke set. The target is to swim at 100% for 20 seconds following by 10 seconds at a slower pace. Once you are able to achieve this, your 8 cycle workout should only be about 4 minutes long.
This sequence of twenty seconds on and ten seconds off is called the “Tabata Protocol”. ?It takes less time and is much more effective than the conventional slow and steady approach of doing aerobic exercises (running, biking,?swimming workout).
When the eight cycles get easy, you can do another either cycles in a row. You don’t need to do more than five cycles. ?You should shoot for a goal of 20 minutes of exercise maximum with this type of workout.
If you are only using this particular workout routine, it can be successfully done about 3 times each week. However, if you are also working to build muscle or are workout out at the gym, you should only do this workout 1-2 times a week.
One tip is to always pay attention to where you are in the pool and what is in front of you so you won’t hit the wall. This can be particularly bad if you are in an intense section of the workout.
If you enjoyed this article, => /”>Swimming Workout, check out my blog for more articles on building muscle and losing fat at Get Ripped.
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