I have to admit that I actually enjoy cardio, but in short bursts. Anything over 30 min pretty much bores my to do death and about 20 min or less is ideal. Last night, I decided to take advantage of my apartment pool for the first time. I’m not a good swimmer which is what makes it such a taxing workout, but I found something that I did like and had a similar feel to sled dragging. I would swim the length of the pool, turn around and run back. I then quit the swimming and I tried running/walking forwards and backwards in the pool (3.5-4 ft deep). Walking forwards really taxed my hip flexors and quads, walking backwards worked my glutes and hamstrings. If you are looking for for something different or want to get an idea of what dragging a sled is like try walking/running in shallow water. Anybody else have some different ideas for a cardiovascular/GPP workout?
Swimming and running in a pool can be a great workout. Check some of the Triathlete Magazines they have some good articles on it.
Just a note of caution. It is not good for fat loss. Years ago when I was training for the Best Ranger Competition, I add this type of training, while my body fat went down I ended up looking fatter. This was according to my favorite Exercise MD because the cool temp of the water caused my body to adapt by moving my body fat to the outside. So be careful.
Jason you’re right,I read about the walking through shallow water thing in a westside article,apparently the russian super heavyweight Vasily Vasiliev (or however you spell it) used to do this after his workouts.Last week I was on holidays,I didn’t have a sled handy so I went down to the beach and walked knee high thru the water,works great.
Alexeev did 200 steps in knee deep water I think. Water adds resistance to the concentric portion of a lift, which makes blood rush through the muscles & clear out any bad stuff. There’s no soreness because there’s no eccentric, which is what causes it. That’s the idea behind sled dragging. I remember when I was a runner, we’d do all our drills in a swimming pool in water that was about waist deep once a week & afterwards I felt like $1,000,000.
Older Lifter: Hmmm. If this is true, if one is planning on getting their abs sugically sculpted it might be a good idea to take up swimming a couple months before…
If pool depth permits try treading water for intervals. If that is too easy try treading water with your arms stretched fully over your head. If that’s too easy try dolphin kicking both legs simultaneously with your arms up. Have fun and don’t drink the pool water!
Hey, Ive heard the same thing about swimming not being as effective for weightloss but the reason was very different. Apparently the swimming makes you hungrier and eat more after training. I was told that if you eat exactly the same amount of food after it is a very good method of weightloss but this is quite difficult because whenever I swim Im ravenous afterwards and almost always eatmore for the rest of the day than if I had run or lifted weights. The reason you became hungrier was over my head but had something to do with the cool temperature that you mentioned.
Speaking of hunger after swimming, my appetite was way higher than normal after my pool workout. I don’t know why either? As for the issues regarding fat loss inhibition or swimming less effectiveness, I don’t buy it. The reason these ideas come about is because many swimmers have the soft look. Having some extra fat usually helps swimmers to go faster due to increased buoyancy. I think that swimming weeds out the lean rock hard bodies (because it is too hard to swim if you keep sinking) and sports in general weeds out the really fat people. I think each sport has a self-selection factor. Does playing basketball make you tall? Absolutely not, but being tall is often an advantage for playing basketball. Same way in swimming, being athletic but slightly soft (body fat 12-18% for men) is probably optimal for swimming. I think swimming or water activities can be a great change of pace and can easily be used to increase energy expenditure and help reduce body fat.
GPP is all about simplicity and what is available to you. I’m sure Coach Davies will tell you this. Find a wheelbarrow, load it up, walk. Find a baseball bat, hack away at a stack of tyres.
This Tuesday I was asked to help work in the trolleys department of the supermarket that I work in. Normally the employees would slam 6 or 7 trolleys together, rope them up and push them across the carpark and back into the store. This would go on for the full day. Well, me and a couple of friends decided to do things differently. We ended up loading together around 60-70 trolleys at the same time, making a huge snake of trolleys across the carpark and we somehow managed to get them back into the store without hitting any cars. It was a great GPP work-out, and I was right at the back, pushing it all!