What Happens To Your Body When You Swim?

Swimming is considered one of the best forms of exercise for people of all fitness levels. But why? What really happens to your body when you jump into a swimming pool? Why do you feel so hungry after a swim? Can swimming actually make you live longer? Today, I'm going to be diving into the science, the muscles you're using, and the claimed health benefits. What do we know? Well, swimming is a great all-round activity because it gets your heart rate up, building endurance, muscle strength, and cardiovascular fitness, all whilst taking impact stresses off the body. It probably comes as no surprise to hear that water is more dense than air, around 800 times more dense, in fact, meaning to move through water requires overcoming far more resistance, which is actually what makes it such a good form of exercise. It requires us to use our entire body from head to toe. In fact, on average, a 30-minute swim at a leisurely pace will burn around 223 calories, in part due to this entire-body workout, but also because your body expends more energy to maintain its core temperature in the water. It also has the added benefit of obviously being non-weight-bearing, which means you're more likely to do it for longer and more frequently. That doesn't mean swimming is easy, though. One of the toughest things to master with swimming is breathing. Unlike a run or bike ride, for example, where your breath tends to be shallow and your exhales forceful as and when you like, with swimming, it tends to be the other way around. You breathe in quickly and deeply and then let the air trickle out whilst your head is in the water. It's thought that this action actually helps to improve the strength of your respiratory muscles. As a result of all of this, you have likely experienced that invigorating but also slightly sleepy feeling after a swim. This is all due to the reasons I've just mentioned, but also because you're likely challenging both your aerobic and your anaerobic energy systems when you swim. Yes, unlike running where you might just head out and hold a consistent pace, with swimming, to break the monotony of lengths, you will often break it up, perhaps add some pace change, stroke change, and structure to the swim, or just race the person in the lane next to you. Well, this can drain your glycogen reserves and leave you feeling rather depleted after a swim and perhaps wanting to raid your fridge at times. In case this isn't enough to sell swimming to you already, results from a recent University of South Carolina study examined medical and physical data of over 40,000 men aged 20 to 90, and unsurprisingly, found that swimmers in the group had a 53% lower mortality rate than their sedentary peers. What was surprising was that they also found a 49% lower mortality rate than with runners. Some suggest that this is because swimming has a positive effect on our artery flexibility, which typically stiffen with age. More supple arteries means better blood flow, which means less strain on our vital organs. Whilst we're talking about blood flow, it might interest you to hear that due to the horizontal position that you swim in and water pressure, it actually promotes blood flow and increases the heart stroke volume, basically meaning more blood is pumped to the body with fewer beats. With all this movement, what happens to your skin? Well, heat is produced as a byproduct of all this movement. In fact, you may have noticed on yourself or other swimmers' skin turning red. This is your blood vessels dilating and bringing heat to the surface of the skin to try and get rid of that heat and regulate your body temperature. What you may not have noticed and may gross you out a little to hear is that you do sweat when you swim like in other sports. Research has shown that this is to a lesser extent than in sports like running, but you do still sweat. Swimmers are often considered to have the best bodies and physiques, and that is mostly because you engage so many muscles when swimming. Like if you went to the gym to lift weights, when you swim, you create micro tears in your muscles. This is why you may feel sore for a day or so after a swim. This can take 24 to 48 hours to recover from, and in this time, your body sends good blood flow to this area to help it heal. This is how they rebuild. You get stronger and build musculature. Because of all this, swimming is great for the head. Like any exercise, this increased blood flow can make us feel more focused and awake. Also, in swimming, we have this weightless sensation as we swim through the water. You get this amazing and refreshing clarity that is quite unique to swimming. This isn't just limited to a swimming pool. Either open water swimming has all the same benefits, but also the added benefit of perhaps connecting with nature, and perhaps the cold water benefits that come with open water swimming, presuming it is cold water. We actually have a whole video on this already, so do go and check that out. What do you think to swimming? Has swimming already changed your life? Have you got the swimming bug? Let us know in the comments section down below. If you've enjoyed today's video and you want to see more videos like this, give this video a thumbs up. If you'd like to learn more about swimming, how to swim, then make sure you subscribe.