Swimming in lake

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Frostbitten007
Frostbitten007 Posts: 84 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
Just a curious question: Does swimming in a lake burn as many calories, more, or less than swimming in a pool. I was trying to find swimming in lake in the list of cardio exercises and nothing popped up. Should I just use regular swimming as the exercise?

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  • lisa_latif
    lisa_latif Posts: 22 Member
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    I think that swimming in a lake or ocean burns a bit more calories than swimming in a pool, because you have the waves and the wind to contend with. Of course, that only holds true if you were swimming against the waves/wind. If you can't find the right kind of swimming, go with the lower calorie burn, and continue with your exercise and food logging as normal, and that way you'll just be ahead of the game.
  • mikeatmichael
    mikeatmichael Posts: 92 Member
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    You'll also burn more calories if the temperature is lower. But remember, in any case you're only estimating calories and they could be off some amount either way based on a number of factors. What really matters is that you are doing it and if you're counting calories that closely ere on the side of caution.
  • sunglasses_and_ocean_waves
    sunglasses_and_ocean_waves Posts: 2,757 Member
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    None of the above. The lake does not have significant enough waves to make any sort of difference. Of course there are some odd lakes that have some wild waves, but I think if the OP were swimming there, she wouldn't have this question. That would be more like ocean swimming.
  • KathryneJY
    KathryneJY Posts: 83 Member
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    The only thing I would caution when counting calories is that unless you are swimming at a sustained pace like you would be when doing lengths at a pool, you need to account for that. I find lake swimming is much less focused and you may not be getting as much burn as you think.


    MFP also far overestimates swimming calories as I found out yesterday after swimming with my HRM. For 42 minutes of light/moderate freestyle swimming, MFP says 432 calories burned. My HRM came in at 279 calories burned. It was a fairly significant effort - non-stop 1350 meters in 42 minutes is pretty good for me. I'm learning to hate my HRM.

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