Are you a swimmer looking to take you performance to the next level?
Are you looking to improve your fitness as well as your swimming pace?
Have you ever had an injury associated with swimming?
If so keep reading, this blog is for you! Below are some of the most important exercises which will help your fitness and athletic performance in and out of the pool.
-
Mountain Climbers
Mountain climbers are excellent whole body strengthening exercise for all swimmers. This exercise works your whole body; your shoulders, glutes, triceps, legs, and your core all get a workout. Mountain climbers also improve your cardio endurance, since when doing these exercises, you are always moving as you would if you were swimming. Mountain climbers can improve your strength and endurance and your overall position while you swim and you’ll develop a more powerful kick for strokes such as freestyle, butterfly, and backstroke.
-
Squat Jumps
Squat jumps are a simple yet a effective exercise to improve your power as a swimmer. Squat jumps will strengthen your calves, glutes, and quads, which will help you push off with more power when finishing a flip turn or the starting block
-
Reverse Flys
This exercise works your upper back and shoulder muscles, which can help protect your shoulder from injury. Strengthening your upper back and shoulders will not only give more power to your strokes but will improve your posture. You can perform this exercise with either dumbbells or a resistance band.
-
Hanging Crunch
The hanging crunch is a fantastic multidimensional core exercise. This exercise will help with all strokes as it aims to improve the core. Strengthening the core is key because it enables you to support your legs at a higher position in the water, in turn giving you a better position and less resistance in the pool. Ensure to hold your body as still as possible is key when doing a hanging crunch, when starting out there might be a tendency for your body to swing.
-
Shoulder Rotations
These are key for shoulder stability and injury prevention. In swimming there is a high number of repetitive shoulder movements within the pool. This exercise improves the strength of the stability muscles required when swimming, taking some of the pressure off the bigger ones essential in all strokes. Shoulder rotations are a beneficial exercise that should be utilised as a warm up to complete before getting into the pool or the gym.
-
Pull ups
All swimmers require strong and powerful back muscles in order to improve their pace in the pool. Pull ups aim to strengthen your back specifically the latissimus dorsi – the long and thin muscle in your back that runs from your armpits to your pelvis, also known as the “lats”. Strengthening your lats assists greatly with pull phase of all common strokes.
-
Single Arm Dumbbell Press
This exercise helps to promote shoulder stability without placing excessive pressure directly onto the joint. As mentioned previously, shoulder stability is important to many swimmers with the excessive amount of stress swimmers put on their shoulders swimming lap after lap. A swimmer with strong shoulder stability reduces their chances of developing shoulder injuries later in their career.
If you are looking to improve your performance as a swimmer, get in touch with Pivotal Motion’s exercise physiologist team today. Our team of Exercise Physiologists will be able to discuss with you in more depth on how to manage your exercise. Book online or call us on 3352 5116.