Karen Pickering - How to dive in at the deep end!
There is nothing we Britons like better than diving in at the deep end. According to Sport England’s Active People Survey conducted last year, 3.24 million adults — almost 8 per cent of the adult population — named swimming as their favourite activity and claimed to clock up 30 minutes or more in the pool at least once a week, more than those taking part in any other sport. Yet, despite its popularity, we are not a nation of Rebecca Adlingtons.
In fact, about 12 million people in the UK cannot swim at all and many of those who can have appalling techniques that prevent them from getting the most out of their time in the water. Experts believe a high proportion of recreational swimmers can’t keep going, even at a snail’s pace, for 20 minutes without spluttering to a halt, which limits the extent to which they can improve their fitness.
“Poor technique makes swimming harder work than it should be,” says David Davies, a British swimmer who won the bronze medal at the Athens 2004 Olympics in the 1,500m freestyle and a silver in Beijing 2008 in the open-water 10km swim. “If you like swimming, then a stroke improvers’ course will enable you to swim farther and faster without much extra effort.”
Karen Pickering, a member of the British swimming team for 19 years and winner of four gold medals at world championships, runs swimming courses. She says even the nation’s favourite stroke, breaststroke, is often swum badly. “Timing is crucial in breaststroke, and the arm and leg actions should never be done at the same time or you could end up going nowhere,” she says. “If you find co-ordi- nation of the stroke tricky, practise the kick on your back so that you can perfect its symmetry.”
As with other strokes, breathing technique is crucial. “Breathe out beneath the water,” she says. “As you move your arms, the head is automatically raised clear of the water allowing you to inhale through the mouth, not the nose. If you swim breastroke to keep your hair dry or the chlorine out of your eyes, then you are almost certainly doing it wrong.”
Second in the popularity stakes is front crawl, which, swum well, is the fastest and most efficient way to get through the water. “Don’t lift your head too high out of the water when you breathe — watch an elite swimmer and you barely notice them take a breath,” Pickering says. “And imagine you are grabbing the water with the palm of your hand and pulling yourself past that hand to propel yourself forward. It’s almost as though you are swimming through a tube.”
Once you have good technique, the key to getting fitter and faster is to vary the speed and stroke with which you swim. “For most people, their lack of progression in swimming comes from too little variation in the water,” Davies says. “Plodding up and down the pool for half an hour will not get you as fit as swimming, say, intermittent bursts of 25 metres at a faster pace with 30 seconds rest between each.” Beginners to fitness swimming should aim to cover about 400m of swimming per session — 16 lengths of a 25m pool — at a medium to high intensity pace (see box, right). Swimming two or three times a week can soon help you to lose weight and improve your fitness.
Water is 1,000 times denser than air and provides up to 12 times the resistance you would get from working out on land. This means that every movement counts — a few lengths of swimming any stroke will use a range of muscles to propel you through the water. “In 30 minutes of steady swimming you can burn 175 calories,” Pickering says. “Become more efficient so that you pick up speed and that could rise to 290 calories for a fast front crawl or breaststroke and 320 for butterfly stroke in the same time.”
As well as burning fat, swimming also strengthens muscles and the heart. In the 32-year Aerobics Centre Longitudinal Study, men who swam several times a week not only lived longer than walkers, runners and couch potatoes, but had better cardiorespiratory fitness. Meanwhile, a study in the journal Respirology last month showed that swimming relieved asthma in children who followed a six-week swimming programme in addition to taking their usual medication. The charity Asthma UK says that the warm humid air in pools opens the airways and often reduces symptoms. And because it acts like a giant cushion for the body, swimming is also recommended by the Arthritis Research Campaign for people with painful joints.
Best of all, swimming is accessible, effective and cheap. “You may have struggled since you were at school, but once things click into place and your breathing becomes fluid and efficient, the sport can be the most enjoyable experience imaginable,” Pickering says. “Get to that point and there’s no looking back — anyone of any age can become fit in the pool.”
ref: www.timesonline.co.uk
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