Is Swimming Considered Cardio or Strength Workout?

One of the questions that we stumble upon in our conversations and research is your uncertainty about the impact pool exercise has on our bodies. Among those ones of the more common is the question is swimming a cardio exercise or a strength exercise?

To understand that we should start by understanding what are the characteristics of those two types of activity, and how do we define and recognize them.

What is cardiovascular activity?

What aerobic exercises are great at is to condition inside of your body – your heart and lungs for example. Another characteristic is that aerobic exercise is continuous and to be most effective they require your pulse to reach a certain level above your resting heart rate and stay there for at least few minutes.

Thanks to the fact swimming is mainly a cardio activity, it can be performed every day as your heart muscle can be exercised even multiple times every day (it is the only muscle in your body that has the endurance allowing for continuous work!).

Swimming builds your muscles less than other similar activities since the water limits how much your muscle can move, but it is great for people who want a healthy toned body instead of very muscular for aesthetic reasons. It also allows your whole body to exercise including back, arms and legs…and all at the same time!

What is strength activity?

Strength-training requires working out against moderate resistance. this resistance can be provided by weights or your body” Pushups and sit-ups are examples of when resistance is provided by your own body.

What strength-training exercises are perfect at is conditioning the „outsides” of your body like arms and legs.

In contrast to swimming – this type of exercises is the stop-and-start type of activity that requires short bursts of effort with rest/stop period performed in series.

How to make the most of the aerobic pool exercise?

Now that we know swimming is mostly a cardio exercise let’s find out how to maximize the benefits you get from every workout session!

As we’ve seen what is required for an effective swimming training is for your pulse to stay in a certain corridor called heart rate zone. Every zone has its benefits and you can learn much more about it here.

The easiest and exciting way to stay in the chosen zone is to use something like Swimmo training watch that will let you know via vibrations when you swim too slow or too fast and will keep the intensity of the swimming workout as planned!

To learn more visit the rest of our page and come back soon for another post on swimming.

Kamil Market Development Expert at Swimmo

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