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Swimming

Swimming is an activity that burns lots of calories, is easy on the joints, supports your weight, builds muscular strength and endurance, improves cardiovascular fitness, cools you off and refreshes you in summer, and one that you can do safely into old age. In this article, I'll review the history of swimming, the benefits, the strokes, how to get started, what to wear, equipment you need, where to do it, and more.

The English are considered the first modern society to develop swimming as a sport. By 1837 swimming competitions were being held in London's six artificial pools, these competitions were organized by the National Swimming Society in England. As the sport grew in popularity many more swimming pools were built, and when a new governing body, the Amateur Swimming Association of Great Britain, was organized in 1880, it numbered more than 300 member clubs.

n 1896, swimming became an Olympic sport for men with the 100 meters and 1500 meters freestyle competitions held in open water. Soon after, as swimming gained popularity, more freestyle events were included, followed by the backstroke, butterfly, breaststroke, and lastly, the individual medley.

For a variety of reasons, women were excluded from swimming in the first several Olympic Games. In 1896 and again in 1906, women could not participate because the developer of the modern games, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, held firmly to the assumption, common in the Victorian era, that women were too frail to engage in competitive sports. It was only at the 1912 Games when women's swimming made its debut at the prompting of the group that later became known as the International Olympic Committee.

The first modern Olympic Games had only four swimming events, three of them freestyle. The second Olympics in Paris in 1900 included three unusual swimming events. One used an obstacle course; another was a test of underwater swimming endurance; the third was a 4,000-metre event, the longest competitive swimming event ever. None of the three was ever used in the Olympics again.

From this humble beginning with four swimming events, the Olympics have now developed to 32 swimming races, 16 for men and 16 for women. The Special Olympics includes competitive swimming for people with disabilities and has 22 events for men and 22 for women.
There are four different strokes used in Olympic swimming: freestyle, breaststroke, butterfly and backstroke.

The programs for men and women are the same, except that the longest race for men is the 1500m while the women’s longest race is the 800m.

In addition to individual events for each of these strokes, individual medley events and relays are contested.

Medley events utilise all four strokes. In the 200m individual medley, competitors swim 50m of butterfly, followed by 50m backstroke, 50m breaststroke and 50m freestyle.

The order is the same for the 400m individual medley, with competitors swimming 100m of each stroke.

In the 4x100m medley relay, the race begins with backstroke, then breaststroke, butterfly and freestyle.

In freestyle and backstroke, swimmers may touch the wall at the end of the pool with any part of their bodies, so most perform tumbleturns, somersaulting in front of the wall and pushing off it with their feet.

However, in individual medley events, swimmers must touch the wall with their hands at the end of the backstroke leg before switching to breaststroke.

Breaststroke and butterfly swimmers have to touch the end of the pool with both hands at the end of each lap, therefore the tumbleturn is not possible.

For breaststroke, freestyle, butterfly and individual medley events, swimmers begin the race by standing on blocks at the end of the pool.

Swimmers are given a warning before a loud beep sounds to start the race.

A false start results in disqualification at the Olympics.

All timing is electronic — pressure pads in the blocks and the wall at the end of the pool register when swimmers have begun and finished their races.

In relays, a team is disqualified if a member of the team leaves the blocks more than 0.03 of a second before the team member in the water touches the wall.

Olympic events take place in a 50m pool, meaning events longer than 50m require laps to be swum.

The pool at the Sydney International Aquatic Centre is three metres deep and has 10 lanes, although only eight will be used for racing. One lane at either side of the pool will remain vacant.

Water in the Olympic pool is regulated to be between 25ºC and 27ºC.

Strokes

Freestyle

Any stroke is permitted in freestyle events, but all competitors choose the crawl stroke in these events because it is the fastest stroke. Because of this, the crawl stroke has become known as freestyle.

When swimming freestyle, some part of the body must remain above the water at all times.

The exception is when swimmers start the race and make turns at the end of each lap.

At these times swimmers are allowed to remain submerged for 15 metres.

 

Butterfly

Butterfly was “invented” for the 1956 Games after some swimmers had begun to exploit a loophole in the breaststroke rules by lifting their arms out of the water.

Like breaststroke, butterfly is swum face down, but some swimmers now breathe to the side, rather than by looking out in front of them.

The kick is a vertical one, and both feet must be moved together.

The arms must be swung forward together.

At the end of each lap, both hands must touch the wall together.

 

Backstroke

Backstrokers must swim on their backs with their faces towards the sky.

They are allowed a degree of body rotation as they swim.

Both the swimmer’s feet must be under the water at the start. After starting, the swimmer can remain underwater for 15 metres.

 

 

 

Breaststroke

This stroke requires swimmers to swim face down, moving their arms and legs at the same time in a horizontal plane.

After each turn, and at the start, swimmers are allowed to make one arm stroke and leg kick while underwater.

The swimmer’s head must break the surface during each complete stroke.

Like the butterfly, the swimmer must touch the end of the pool with both hands at the end of each lap

Record tally  

Nation  

LC  

SC  

Total  

LC  

SC  

Total  

Men

Women

19

 United States

9

4

13

4

2

6

14

 Australia

3

4

7

2

5

7

5

 Canada

 

2

2

1

2

3

5

 Germany

2

1

3

2

 

2

4

 China

1

 

1

3

 

3

4

 France

1

3

4

 

 

 

4

 Great Britain

1

 

1

2

1

3

4

 Italy

 

 

 

2

2

4

4

 Netherlands

 

 

 

1

3

4

4

 South Africa

1

3

4

 

 

 

3

 Spain

1

1

2

 

1

1

3

 Zimbabwe

 

 

 

1

2

3

2

 Japan

 

 

 

 

2

2

2

 Sweden

 

 

 

2

 

2

1

 Austria

 

1

1

 

 

 

1

 Brazil

1

 

1

 

 

 

1

 Croatia

 

 

 

 

1

1

1

 Hungary

 

1

1

 

 

 

1

 Russia

 

1

1

 

 

 

Swimming is a fabulous workout, which has been found to be not only beneficial for the human body, but also perfect for relaxing the mind of the person undertaking it. In summer time, it serves as an excellent exercising choice, which helps you burn off calories, while cooling down your body. Swimming provides you the best of both worlds. On one hand, it provides the cardio benefits of running and on the other hand, it paves way for you to achieve weight training strength building benefits. The reservoir of swimming health benefits is really comprehensive, making the aerobic exercise in demand these days. let us explore more on the health benefits of swimming.

Swimming Health Benefits
  • Swimming helps maintain the blood pressure and cholesterol of a person, thus ensuring the well being of his/her heart.
  • It is good for the health of your lungs and also reduces the risk of stroke, heart attack and diabetes.
  • Swimming enhances the flexibility of your joints and provides the scope for boosting your physical activity workout level. In other words, it helps a great deal in your weight loss program.
  • It is perfect for those people who have a hard time carrying out weight-bearing, land-based physical activities. This is because your weight in water is about 1/10 of your weight on land.
  • For pregnant women as well as for people who are suffering from arthritis and back pain problem, there can be no better workout choice than swimming.
  • Swimming minimizes the risk of injuries from physical activity. So, you can easily try out the delightful exercise and enjoy the health fitness benefits it offers, without any attached risk.
  • If indulged in on a regular basis, swimming can help build the endurance, muscle strength and cardio-vascular fitness of a person.
  • You can indulge in swimming before as well as after a strenuous workout on ground, as a warm-up and cool-down activity, respectively.
  • It helps a person exercise almost all the muscles of his/her body, with the main focus being on arms and legs.
  • The people suffering from injuries, back pain, arthritis and disabilities, who cannot indulge in a normal workout, can undertake swimming.
  • Swimming has been associated with relieving the joint pains, high blood pressure and discomfort that are often experienced during pregnancy.
  • Indulging in swimming can help post-surgery patients, who adopt an otherwise sedentary lifestyle, avoid muscular atrophy.
  • It is found to have soothing effect on the mind as well as the body of a person, mainly by regulating breathing and stimulating circulation.

 


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