Does anyone swim to lose weight?

What a great idea, 2 miles a week, I swim about 1/2 mile when I go swim, and I could go 4 times a week. Neat! I love how swimming makes my whole body feel tired - and my kids are independent swimmers, so I can just do laps at the neighborhood pool (25 meter) while they play. so 16 laps is a half mile right? 32 lengths? I like this goal! Thanks

I am just started going to the gym in the morning to get my swimming in. And in the afternoon, get my weights in.

I do! I really started swimming in training for the triathlon I'm doing, by I'm finding it's such a great workout I want to keep it up at least once a week when it's over (and in preparation for the next one!).

There ya go, my picture is even of me in my bathing suit

I swim 4-5 times a week but consider I'm counting enough already at the moment with counting calories without having to count lengths too! I prefer just to enjoy myself and log the amount of time spent swimming rather than turning it into sport.

i usually take the 60 minute water aerobics class followed by about 15-30 minutes of breast stroke and the carlories i burn always surpass my goal! Great way to keep ALL the muscles working and burn calories.

I've been swimming to keep in shape for quite some time now although sporadically. I swim in a 25m pool, so one mile = 64 lengths (1600 meters). It's techically 1609 metres but that's less than 64 1/2 lengths.

I've been swimming mostly 1k (40 laps) at lunch or 1 mile (64 laps) in the mornings, but recently I've been seeing what other distances I can do. I've got my 1k down to under 17 minutes and my mile just under 28 minutes. My speed has really improved since I stopped having regular breakfasts and started doing just raw, organic veggies in the Vitamix for breakfast. I already avoid just about all foods that could contain genetically engineered ingredients and rarely eat packaged, processed foods but the juicing (on the week-ends, Omega J8004) and the blenderizing (breakfasts MON~FRI, VitaMix) have really given me more speed and stamina.

Last Sunday I did a 5K swim in 91 minutes and 30 seconds, that's 200 laps of a 25m pool. This morning I did a two mile swim (128 laps) in 56 minutes and 30 seconds. It feels AWESOME to start the day like this, although I usually do a shorter 1k lunch swim still TUE~THU when the morning swim is only 2 lanes for laps. MON and FRI it's 4 lanes open so much easier. During Summer when school's closed I'll be going all mornings and hopefully doing 2 miles every morning for a total of perhaps 12 miles/week. I may still reserve Tuesday for a lunch swim and do sprints, I think once a week it's good to do short bursts with equal rest to activate those high muscle fibers, get good growth hormone response.

I was almost 250 lbs in Summer 2011. I was out of the pool last year for six months with a shoulder strain from doing too much sprints, I was doing high intensity every day. Not good. Been back in since July last year and currently down to 220 lbs. My goal is 190. I haven't been that weight since probably 1995! I'm 40 this year. My goal was to not be overweight in my 40's like I have been throughout my 30's. I've been losing around 1.5~2lbs/month, slowly and surely keeping it off.

Swimming is an amazing exercise. The more I swim the less I use an inhaler for asthma. Haven't used one since July last year! Keep up the swimming!

Also even if the pool is cold, you won't insulate yourself when you're working out. If you're just bobbing up and down in the water you'll put on fat, but if your heart rate is going then you're losing fat.

There is a swimming group here on MFP if anyone if interested. They have been very helpful to me.

thanks for info, how do I find them? loing fwd to starting when I get home.

You should make sure the pool is heated. Long periods of time spent in a colder pool can result in a thicker layer of dermal fat.

Good Info....never knew this.....