Olympic medallist and fitness expert Michael Jamieson explains why swimming will boost your time in the gym.
Michael developed training sessions which targeted every muscle in his body and swimming is especially important he claims to “hit smaller muscles that don’t get as much attention.”
Each stroke will help work and develop different muscle groups. For example breast stroke and the front crawl targets the muscles in the forearms. Holding yourself flat in the water will help improve your overall core strength too as your abs are working hard to hold the position.
Michael reveals that “Swimming rapidly improves your strength, especially when it comes to your own bodyweight,”
He suggests figuring out if you want to build over all strength or work on specific body parts such as arms or legs. You can isolate muscle groups by wrapping your legs around a buoy and just using your arms for example which will force you arm muscles to work harder. On the flip side you can hang on to a float and kick your legs to work your hamstrings, quads and calves.
The great advantage to getting fit through swimming is that there is a low risk of obtaining injury. Swimmers bodies also tend to be very evenly balanced with a strong core and strong arms and legs.
40 minutes of swimming can burn up to 1000 calories too – making it a better calorie burning exercise than even running. Your body will also burn more calories to keep warm in the water too so swimming is really the best thing you can do for your body.
