Swimming for weight loss
justbeachy01
Posts: 53 Member
I lost 30 lbs last year...gained 40 lbs this year. I am SO out of shape that exercise is hard. I have started swimming for 30 mins at a time at a local pond. I do the breast stroke and can definitely feel the burn in my arms, but I didn't burn as many calories as I thought I would (I wore a heart monitor).
I have always loved swimming, and my parents called me "fish" growing up...so this form of exercise is great to me, but it is really helping with weight loss and getting me in shape? Or do I need to focus on a more intense form of cardio? Thanks for any input!
I have always loved swimming, and my parents called me "fish" growing up...so this form of exercise is great to me, but it is really helping with weight loss and getting me in shape? Or do I need to focus on a more intense form of cardio? Thanks for any input!
0
Replies
-
Waiting for Stephen to show up - his story is great for encouraging newbies around here.
Swimming can be more intense than running! Front crawl does burn more than breast, as a general rule, but if you push yourself hard you can get your heart rate really high no matter what stroke you're doing. Try doing 'sprints' where you push yourself really hard from 20 strokes, then easy 20, hard 20.
Regardless of how many calories I've burned, swimming is the most fantastic weight loss tool I've found - because the best exercise isn't the one that burns the most calories, it's the one you'll keep doing. I was also a 'fish' when I was little, so swimming was that for me.
0 -
That is such a great response! Thank you so much! I want to get back into freestyle, but I've found breast stroke is easier for me so I am easing into it.
Also, does anyone wear ear plugs? I really can't get water in my ears, I get such bad swimmer's ear!!0 -
Heart rate isn't a great measure of power output (calorie burn) for swimming. The water pressure actually helps your heart pump more per beat, which means it pumps rather slower (bpm) than on land. It's actually pretty hard to get a good estimate of calorie burn in the water, since it is *so* dependent on how efficient a person's form is.
I don't wear ear plugs. I do swear by Swim-Ear, which are drops you can use after swimming to clear out any residual stuck water. They help prevent outer ear infections (swimmer's ear).
ETA: Swim-Ear
One thing to watch out for with swim and weight loss: it can make you REALLY, REALLY hungry. Some kind of physiological reaction to being submerged in water (colder temperatures). I sometimes have some luck limiting post-swim appetite by either standing in a hot shower for a little while (my gym does not have a hot tub or sauna, but the study that examined this effect found some benefit from one of those) OR by doing a little land-based cardio, bike or jog.
It's totally worth it, though! For fun+cardio+full body resistance+easy on your joints (except shoulders, haha), you can't beat swimming!0 -
I fight the post swim hunger by planning ahead. I know it will do that to me, so I eat a protein packed meal or snack 15-30 minutes before hitting the pool, and then I plan on either a snack or meal after, usually something high in volume but low in calories, like celery and cucumbers or a salad.
I don't have the story that Stephen has (yet!) but so far I've lost about 20 lbs watching by tracking my food, swimming and doing yoga, so I definitely think it works. It's also giving me confidence, allows me time to just be (which I don't get much of with my job), and sometimes I find that I do my best problem solving by "not thinking" in the pool. Apparently while I'm counting laps and focusing on breathing, it gives my brain a chance to work out the problem and suddenly I have an answer I had no idea was coming!0 -
Heh ...how can I not post now ...so yeah I totally recommend swimming for weight loss. I started out 6 months ago with a 20 year couch potato habit and having never had any formal swim coaching/team experience. But my diabetic nutritionist wanted me to start doing something every day to burn off excess glycogen in the blood. I am heavy enough that I was worried about joint damage from many types of workouts, but swimming is easy on the joints. Most bodyweight exercises are more difficult because of excess weight, but with swimming it just makes you more buoyant. And when you compare burn rate on most exercise calculators swimming is generally considered to have one of the higher burn rates. Unlike a class or team activity I don't have to depend on anyone else's schedule for my swims (and my gyms lap lanes are 24/7/365). Lastly, and most important for me is that when I finish a swim I feel cool, clean, refreshed (and tired). Instead of hot, dirty, stinky (and tired) like I do with most drylander workouts.
Per my doc's advice I started doing 30 minutes/day every day. And I added 5 minutes to that every two weeks until I got up to an hour. for the first three minutes I was mostly concerned with 'establishing the habit'. I would occasionally count/time my laps just for information. But as long as I was 'putting in the minutes' I didn't hold myself to any specific performance goals. (Although I still saw significant improvement during that time). Once I had been doing 60 mins/day for two weeks I started actively trying to add drills, improve aerobic fitness, and work on performance goals to continue to challenge myself. (And I still am).
The results have been excellent. When I first started I was getting in about 625m in 30 minutes. My first 'mile' swim was in my first '55' minute week (actually took me 56 minutes). By the end of my 2nd week of 60 minute workouts my mile time was 52 minutes, and I was swimming about 1850m total. Now I swim about 2050m on a good timed day, best mile time 48 minutes. ALSO, after 6 months of swimming my Doc has taken me off my diabetes meds entirely. And I have dropped 106lbs. I'm now occasionally doing drylander workouts that would have been entirely impossible for me 6 months ago.
I want to reinforce some things others have said.
Adding in sprints is still the hardest thing for me, but is definitely also the best way to increase the challenge of your workout and burn rate. When I first started 50% of my lengths were backstroke because that allowed me to 'catch my breath'. I eventually started increasing my ratio of front crawl, because the breath control factor made that stroke hardest. But forcing myself to do more of them also does the most to improve my aerobic fitness.
Also, swimming definitely decreases your heart rate. It is a combination of the cold effect (which actually increases your burn rate). And the fact that being mostly submerged decreases the amount of pressure your heart needs to output to circulate your blood. And that your body is mostly horizontal instead of vertical which also makes circulation easier on your heart. I cant remember where I got this number, but I think the 'swim factor' is about 15%. So compare your swimming heart rate to a heart rate 15% higher. Also because of design factors many HRMs don't work well in the water. Many of the optical HRMs do not anticipate the light bending effect that water has on the laser used to monitor your pulse. Many of the chest-strap models are not designed well for dealing with the hydrotubulence that swiming generates so they will slip out of place or flip over, or otherwise change positions to give inaccurate measurements.
Oh ...and when i first started I pretty much considered all the 'swimming equipment' to be superfluous add-ons of the obsessive pool rat. Until I was swimming every day and my eyes felt like sandpaper, my hair felt like straw and I was half-deaf from water in my ears. Now I love my swim cap, goggles, and earbud/earplugs ...and I keep thinking about buying fins for hands and feet, and maybe my own pullbuoy and kickboard.0 -
Wow Stephen, thank you for sharing your story. That gives me a lot of hope that swimming is really going to be my best bet. And I'm with you, I hate the after feeling of a workout and being sweaty and disgusting. With swimming, you just feel refreshed 0
-
stephenrhinton wrote: »Oh ...and when i first started I pretty much considered all the 'swimming equipment' to be superfluous add-ons of the obsessive pool rat. Until I was swimming every day and my eyes felt like sandpaper, my hair felt like straw and I was half-deaf from water in my ears. Now I love my swim cap, goggles, and earbud/earplugs ...and I keep thinking about buying fins for hands and feet, and maybe my own pullbuoy and kickboard.
Don't forget the bag to carry it all in, too!
Welcome, Beachy! Stephen covered it all splendidly. I've been swimming for about 10 years 2-3 times a week and still managed to gain a bit of weight (about 10-15 lbs) over that period, so like anything else, you can't swim your way out of bad eating habits. Definitely watch the hunger after swimming. Like Kida said, anything you stick with is a good thing and chlorine can be addictive.
I do wear earplugs. Got tired of swimmers ear.
0 -
Welcome, beachy! I had gotten serious about fitness and food after 40+ years of being sedentary and "happy fat." I wasn't obese, but I reached a turning point (time to buy new jeans?) and I started running. Fell in love with it, but got injured. I became bored and worried about putting the weight back on, so I turned to the pool-water fitness at first. That's something else to consider. You work at your own pace, so as your body improves, you just work harder. All of the benefits of being in the water swimming apply, and it's a group activity, which I like. I turned to laps because it looked like something to add to my proverbial toolbox, in the event that I was ever presented with "no dryland activities" from a doc. I've kept the weight off (a year with minimal running, mostly water fitness and swimming laps) and found out that I love swimming. For as hard as I am working, I SHOULD be losing weight, but as mpeters reminds us, you can't outrace too many calories "in."
You're in good company here! We're glad you found us!!0 -
After the third doctor told me I need to stop martial arts training and avoid any impact exercise due to the degenerative osteoarthritis in my feet I decided it was time to stop those things.
Of course, I didn't immediately replace it with other activity. Weight crept up to over 300#.
I finally got tired of seeing my chin sitting on my collar bone.
I had been swimming a mile a few times a month but nothing consistent. I started making the time to swim every day. Stayed at a mile for a little while. They I started challenging myself to add a quarter mile. Then a half, before long I doing 2 miles a day and a 5km once a month. Then the 5km was every weekend. Then the 5km became my 'short' swim. Now my daily swim is 4 miles. And I'm about 100# lighter with more to go.
So yes, swimming can be part of your plan.
My resting heart rate used to be 85. Now it is 61.0 -
Agree with what everyone says.
I too lost 15 kilos (about 33 pounds) through swimming and calorie counting.
Yes swimming can be as intense as any other cardio out there.
What you have to watch out for however, is that swimming is one exercise where you can cheat yourself that you are doing a lot of work, when you really aren't.
Given that it's low impact, people sometimes think they can go through a very easy swim, then tell themselves they have actually had an intense workout, because it's "low impact"!
If it felt easy, and you were breathing easy, then it probably was LOW intensity!
So it is important to start out from where you are and where you're comfortable.
Then set goals and continue to work to up them both in distance and speed. The sort of thing that you saw Stephen do.
When you remain in beginner's comfort zone for an extended period, the beneficial effects will not be pronounced!
So yeah, swimming is great and I recommend it too as everyone else does.
But for it to work from an intense cardio/ weightloss perspective, you need to push yourself in the pool just as hard as you would with any other intense type of cardio.
And if you do, it does wonders, and gets your physique looking better than running ever could.
As someone said, mixing in some dryland exercise once or twice a week with the swims, further aids the weight loss and generally strength, and is beneficial to your swimming too! 0 -
Yes of course it can help. But sadly for most people losing weight is a lot more about calories in, than calories burned.
But being fitter makes you feel 100x better whatever your weight. The motivation might start as earning calories to make the diet less hard, or getting a better shape, or burning off fat - but In time it is just good to be able to bounce up the stairs, and know your heart is healthy and happy.
I first joined MFP to lose a bit of weight and get a bit fitter. I did both, but the fitter bit proved more lasting. I need to lose some pounds again now, and to do this I will have to cut back more on cake even more than add crawl. But I'll do a bit of both.. now I am fitter, and feel fitter, I am much happier in my skin....and I am carrying my extra cuddly bits an awful lot better than before anyway.
So yes swimming is great - if it becomes an excercise you can get into!
0 -
I have a really bad knee injury and just recently able to run again with my weight getting back to normal. I used swimming and the elliptical for a great portion of my fat loss. Now down >50 lbs and reset my goal to lose another 15.
I never entered my swim time into MFP as I want to ensure I'm in deficit - I use a Polar to track my performance.0 -
Gently, I could have written this! I need to start logging again (I did, several times, but not consistently). I did buy a bunch of new skirts for work this summer, and all (YES, all) were a size too big. I bought one at the "scary small size that I have never been" and wore it today. Go figure. Still, I'm about 10-15 lbs away from where I should be.gentlygently wrote: »Yes of course it can help. But sadly for most people losing weight is a lot more about calories in, than calories burned.
But being fitter makes you feel 100x better whatever your weight. The motivation might start as earning calories to make the diet less hard, or getting a better shape, or burning off fat - but In time it is just good to be able to bounce up the stairs, and know your heart is healthy and happy.
I first joined MFP to lose a bit of weight and get a bit fitter. I did both, but the fitter bit proved more lasting. I need to lose some pounds again now, and to do this I will have to cut back more on cake even more than add crawl. But I'll do a bit of both.. now I am fitter, and feel fitter, I am much happier in my skin....and I am carrying my extra cuddly bits an awful lot better than before anyway.
So yes swimming is great - if it becomes an excercise you can get into!
0 -
So true!
80% of the weight loss is the calorie/ food intake and 20% exercise!
So even an ideal exercise regimen is unlikely to undo the damage of continuing bad calorie/ food intake control!0 -
I break it down to a simple concept for me. "Eat to lose weight. Exercise to eat more "AquaticQuests wrote: »So true!
80% of the weight loss is the calorie/ food intake and 20% exercise!
So even an ideal exercise regimen is unlikely to undo the damage of continuing bad calorie/ food intake control!
0 -
Hi all! I am new to swimming, and have gone about 8 times in the last two weeks. I've been focusing a lot on getting my breathing and form correct during freestyle, and have to take a break after every length because I don't know how to do it in a "low impact" way!
Just by counting my heart beats, after every length my heart rate easily gets into the 160s, so working just as hard as when I'm pushing myself to do cardio on land.
I've been doing 2 lengths of a modified breast stroke or using a kick board as a warm up, then doing 6 to 8 lengths freestyle, with breaks between each length to allow my heart rate to come down slightly and regain my breath, and another 2 lengths of the same as my warm up used as a cool down to slowly bring my heart rate down.
It is just a start (being 318 lbs and just starting out with swimming, so I think I'm doing a great job!), but does anyone have super beginner routines that I could keep in mind to mix up my time in the pool a bit?0 -
How about 0 to 700 (yards)?
One of the things that program suggests is to mix up swimming and deep water running (with or without a flotation belt). Pool running is one of the more boring ways to spend time in the pool, but I love it in that it can be as hard or as easy as you need it to be on a given lap.0 -
Marissa, I was right where you are a year or so ago. I could swim 1.5 lengths and then had to take a break. One of the things I did was make my motto "just keep moving." That meant if I couldn't swim freestyle because of breathing or heart rate, I'd do something that was less intense, like kick only or work on backstroke. That let me keep moving but also work on getting my breath back.
I went from having to swim a kick length or two every 2-3 lengths to swimming a full freestyle mile last week, so I promise you that you will see improvement. Good job so far, keep at it!0 -
Yeah like LR2 said when I was starting out 'just keep moving' was my goal. So I alternated front crawl, backstroke ...because on my back I can get my breath back. And really when I first started the backstroke lengths were very much 'slow easy' lengths. Eventually I got to the place where I was still catching my breath, but my effort/heart rate wasn't slowing. And I faithfully added 5 minutes to my swim time every 2 weeks until I built up to an hour.0
-
Gently, I could have written this! I need to start logging again (I did, several times, but not consistently). I did buy a bunch of new skirts for work this summer, and all (YES, all) were a size too big. I bought one at the "scary small size that I have never been" and wore it today. Go figure. Still, I'm about 10-15 lbs away from where I should be.girlwithcurls2 wrote: »
[/quote]
That is so cool. Congrats curls! I have a ton of clothing waiting for me to return back to the normal me.0 -
Marissa, I was right where you are a year or so ago. I could swim 1.5 lengths and then had to take a break. One of the things I did was make my motto "just keep moving." That meant if I couldn't swim freestyle because of breathing or heart rate, I'd do something that was less intense, like kick only or work on backstroke. That let me keep moving but also work on getting my breath back.
I went from having to swim a kick length or two every 2-3 lengths to swimming a full freestyle mile last week, so I promise you that you will see improvement. Good job so far, keep at it!
Those are great tips! That way I spend the minute "resting" but still moving! I never even thought to incorporate backstroke into my routine for that reason, thanks for suggesting it!stephenrhinton wrote: »Yeah like LR2 said when I was starting out 'just keep moving' was my goal. So I alternated front crawl, backstroke ...because on my back I can get my breath back. And really when I first started the backstroke lengths were very much 'slow easy' lengths. Eventually I got to the place where I was still catching my breath, but my effort/heart rate wasn't slowing. And I faithfully added 5 minutes to my swim time every 2 weeks until I built up to an hour.
Stephen, that is a great motivator, and hopefully I can achieve the same!0 -
@MarissaTriesAgain before long you'll be counting your swim distance in miles 0
-
Wow, Stephen, you have done great! I remember when you first started and am now very proud of how well you've done. I always hate it when people say they're proud of someone else when that someone else has achieved something. They didn't do it; what do they have to be proud of? But it's sort of making sense now. I'm proud to know you and to have seen your dedication to your health. Great job!!!stephenrhinton wrote: »... ALSO, after 6 months of swimming my Doc has taken me off my diabetes meds entirely. And I have dropped 106lbs. ...
0 -
Fantastic
Wow, Stephen, you have done great! I remember when you first started and am now very proud of how well you've done. I always hate it when people say they're proud of someone else when that someone else has achieved something. They didn't do it; what do they have to be proud of? But it's sort of making sense now. I'm proud to know you and to have seen your dedication to your health. Great job!!!stephenrhinton wrote: »... ALSO, after 6 months of swimming my Doc has taken me off my diabetes meds entirely. And I have dropped 106lbs. ...
0 -
If I'm really honest, I swim so i can eat more
By the time i get to work, when I'm home anyway, I'm at least 1200 kCal in deficit and that is after about 300 kCal of pre swim protein shake.
The mental health boost from swimming is a big plus too.
So there is more to gain from swimming than losing pounds/stones/k0 -
I drop weight easily when I'm in a regular swimming routine-- it's about the only time I DO lose weight.
@fishgutzy is right about the mental boost-- in addition to simply burning calories. When I'm swimming regularly, I feel like an athlete in training (even if I look like a potato in a swim cap . . .) and that encourages me plan my meals more intentionally, say "no" to garbage [because I'm an ATHLETE, you know. . .], and log more faithfully.
0 -
rosebarnalice wrote: »
@fishgutzy is right about the mental boost-- in addition to simply burning calories. When I'm swimming regularly, I feel like an athlete in training (even if I look like a potato in a swim cap . . .) and that encourages me plan my meals more intentionally, say "no" to garbage [because I'm an ATHLETE, you know. . .], and log more faithfully.
This is so true. It's the reason I threatened my students today with making sure they go home on time. When they go home on time, so can I, and then I get to do the things that let me take care of me - swimming and yoga, mostly - and when I'm doing those things then I feel good and want to do the food part too.0
This discussion has been closed.