Are you a swimmer, do you ever swim or are you considering swimming? Or are you looking for a sport to build fitness or to lose weight? Swimming is a sport with lifeguard training many benefits. Actually, every athlete has something to go swimming with some regularity. Do you want to know what the benefits of swimming are? You can read that in this article!
Muscle strengthening
You use a lot of muscles while swimming. Every muscle group is actually put to work while swimming. This way you use the muscles in your legs, arms, shoulders, back, chest and abdomen. Swimming strengthens these muscles, but swimming is also relaxing. Swimming is recommended if you suffer from a stiff neck and/or back.
Improving your fitness
Swimming contributes to improving your fitness. It increases your lung capacity, making you less fatigued during physical activity. To improve your fitness with swimming, we recommend to use a schedule and always go for more than half an hour of frenetic swimming before entering the pool.
Little chance of injuries
When you swim you have little chance of injury. This is because your muscles, tendons and joints are considerably relieved due to your weightlessness. It is also not for nothing that injured athletes often work on their recovery in a swimming pool.
Burning calories
Swimming and weight loss go very well together. In many cases, half an hour of active swimming already burns 300 calories. Note: the number of calories burned depends on your swimming intensity, but also on your body weight. This means that the number of calories you burn cannot be recorded, as it differs per situation.
To fall off
As mentioned, you burn a lot of calories when you swim. If your goal is to lose weight, regular swimming is highly recommended. This also applies to all endurance sports. Think running and cycling. Endurance sports burn fat in contrast to explosive sports such as football and fitness where you mainly burn carbohydrates.
Reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease
Active swimming lowers your blood pressure and cholesterol level, which reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease. It should be noted that swimming once a week is not sufficient in this case. You will need to actively exercise for half an hour at least three times a week.
Strengthening your bones
Swimming improves bone density . The higher your bone density, the less likely you are to fracture. A high bone density is therefore crucial and certainly important when you get older.
Stress reduce
Sports in a general sense reduces stress and that is no different with swimming. During exercise you make the substance endorphins . Endorphins are also called a happiness hormone and ensure that you feel less pain.
In addition, your muscles relax when you are in the water. The combination of these two ensures that you get more energy and less stress.
Better night’s sleep
Regular swimming improves your sleep. First of all, it is of course the case that you have become more tired as a result of the exercise. But besides that, you have less stress because of swimming, so that you doze off earlier and often sleep better and deeper.
Full body workout
Swimming works every muscle in the body. Both your upper and lower body are trained, just like muscles you didn’t even know you had. In addition, it also loosens your back so that you will suffer less from back problems if you swim regularly.
Swimming also helps to build muscle mass. Because water provides resistance, swimming is the perfect strength training. Make sure that you alternate different strokes, otherwise you will not train all your muscles yet and you will not make optimal use of the opportunity.
Building fitness
Another big advantage of swimming is that it increases your lung capacity, which ensures a better condition. Just like with any other sport, you increase your fitness with swimming, but with swimming it goes a lot faster than with other sports.
In addition, swimming is also better for your heart as the risk of developing cardiovascular disease decreases. This is because regular swimming lowers blood pressure and cholesterol levels. Also, blood flows back to your heart more easily since water exerts more pressure than outside air. This ensures that your heart has to work 10% – 15% less hard.
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