Swimming

Swimming is full body conditioning with almost no impact. Your lats, shoulders, triceps and trunk do most of the pulling, your legs contribute more than people think, and your heart rate goes wherever you want it to go. It is also the most technique dependent conditioning on this site. A strong lifter who cannot swim will gas out in fifty yards, and that is a skill problem, not a fitness problem. If you are training for anything that involves water, get in the water.

How to Perform

1. Warm up with two to four easy lengths, breathing every third stroke, before you touch a hard interval.
2. Push off the wall under the surface and hold a tight streamline for two or three strokes before you start pulling.
3. Keep your head in line with your spine and look down, not forward. A lifted head drops the hips and doubles the drag.
4. Rotate from the hips and shoulders together so each arm enters long in front of the same shoulder.
5. Kick from the hip with loose ankles. Small and fast beats big and slow.
6. Swim the prescribed distance or time, rest on the wall for the prescribed interval, and repeat.

Tips

• Never train alone in open water, and never do breath hold work without a qualified person watching you. Shallow water blackout kills strong swimmers.
• Distance per stroke beats stroke rate. Count strokes per length and try to hold the count as the pace rises.
• If you are new, buy an hour with a coach before you buy a training plan. It is the fastest progress you will make.
• No pool, no problem for general conditioning: rowing hits a similar muscle set with a similar joint cost.
• Chlorine wrecks skin and hair long before it wrecks your shoulders. Rinse and move on.