Eat right for your sport & health
Here Are Some Benefits of Swimming
- Swimming is good exercise.
- Swimming helps to reduce stress.
- Swimming is a lifetime sport that benefits the body and the whole person.
- Swimming does exercise almost the entire body including your heart, lungs, and muscles, with very little joint strain.
- Swimming does burn calories at a rate of about 3 calories a mile per pound of bodyweight.
- Swimming is a healthy activity that can be continued for a lifetime, and the health benefits swimming offers for a lifetime are worth the effort it
takes to get to the swimming pool.
- Swimming can develop a swimmer's general strength, cardiovascular fitness and endurance.
- Swimming also develops life skills such as sportsmanship, time management, self-discipline, goal setting, and an increased sense of self worth through
the participation in the sport.
Swimming is a great workout because you need to move your whole body against the resistance of the water
- Keeps your heart rate up but takes some of the impact stress off your body
- Builds endurance, muscle strength and cardiovascular fitness
- Helps maintain a healthy weight, healthy heart and lungs
- Tones muscles and builds strength
- Provides an all over body workout, as nearly all of your muscles are used during swimming.
Swimming has many other benefits including
- Being a relaxing and peaceful form of exercise
- Alleviating stress
- Improving coordination, balance and posture
- Improving flexibility
- Providing good low impact therapy for some injuries and conditions
- Providing a pleasant way to cool down on a hot day
- Being available in many places you can swim in swimming pools, beaches, lakes, and rivers
- Always make sure that the environment you choose to swim in is safe
Historical and Fun Facts
- The oldest form of stroke used is the breaststroke.
- Ancient drawings and paintings found in Egypt depicting people swimming date back to 2500 BCE.
- Swimming first became an Olympic event in 1896.
- The first recorded swimming races were held in Japan in 36 B.C.
- The Titanic was the first ocean liner to have a swimming pool and a gym.
- Mark Spitz was the first Olympic swimmer to win seven gold medals in a single Olympiad in the 1972 games.
- An olympic sized pool can hold from 700,000 to 850,000 gallons of water depending on the size.
- Elephants use their trunks as natural snorkels and can swim as much as 20 miles a day.
- An hour of vigorous swimming can burn up to 650 calories.
- Niagara Falls has enough water to fill up all of the pools in the US in less than three days.
- Sixty-five percent of people in the US don't know how to swim.
- Swimmers sweat in the pool.
And Finally...
Swimmers use nearly every muscle in their bodies.
While there are so many people out there to dismiss swimming as a 'real sport', swimming is one of the most intense sports there is. Why? Swimming is an all over-body exercise. Yes, swimming uses more muscles than baseball and football.