Winter offers some new alternatives for cross training such as cross-country skiing or ice skating. However, winter also makes it difficult to run outdoors. IN outside temperatures are lower, and darkens earlier.
That’s why many runners are looking for alternative cardio options in the winter. Swimming training is a great opportunity. Swimming exercises burn tons of calories. Swimming training involves many different muscle groups. The water maintains a large portion of your body weightwhich makes it a form of low-impact exercise for those with delicate joints or returning from a running injury.
Why swimming training is a great cardio alternative
Swimming training burns an average of 500-800 calories per hour. The number depends on the correct performance and speed of your movements (muscle activity). Athletes new to running you can also take advantage of swimming training to get more cardio without risking injury while running.
Basic endurance training in swimming
- 10-minute warm-up run of your choice.
- 5 minutes of acceleration over a certain distance (25, 50 or 100 m). Start slowly and gradually increase the pace until you reach your maximum speed.
- 10 minutes of exercise to improve the effectiveness of your technique. These include exercises designed for
- Improve your body position in the water (sliding exercises)
- Exercises to improve the drive in water (sculpting exercises)
- and exercises to improve your technique in a specific stroke (eg freestyle).
- You can choose from exercises with general technique (such as freestyle with closed fists, kicking from the thighs and maintaining a high grip on the elbows) or specific exercises recommended by a swimming coach.
- Now choose a distance between 25 and 200 m, depending on your individual fitness level. Swim this distance as many times as you can within the time you have. After each interval, rest for 20-30 seconds. You need to choose an interval tempo that challenges you but doesn’t exhaust you right away. If you can, you should measure your first interval with a stopwatch and then try to keep that pace at subsequent intervals. This not only strengthens your cardiovascular system, but also pushes your muscles to their limits and thus helps you burn serious calories.
- Cool down for 5 minutes to complete the workout.
Tips for your swimming workout
Intense endurance training causes yours the body burns a lot of calories and – as is often desired – high fat calories. But be careful: it also burns a large number of carbohydrate calories.
This is important because our body has only a limited number of carbohydrates available for burning (unlike fat). They are stored in the form of glycogen. When your glycogen stores are depleted, your body sends a signal immediately. How do you know? You’re starving. So, make sure you eat a balanced combination of foods before and after swimming training. If you want to burn more fat than carbohydrates, you need to train longer and at a lower intensity. This is known as extensive endurance.
- Advantages of extensive endurance: You will not feel hungry immediately after training. It also burns more fat proportionately.
- Disadvantages of extensive endurance: Burning calories per hour is slightly lower than with intense endurance training.
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