Best Core Exercises for Swimmers With Hannah Miley
- 9 Jan 2019
Swimming core strength is a vital foundation for success at any level of the sport, whether you're looking to win an Olympic gold medal or simply improve your training times.
Not only do you need the power to generate your speed through the water, you also need the strength and ability to streamline your body and reduce drag.
Swimming core strength is essential to performing both of these tasks efficiently and successfully.
Your core is your body's engine room. It is the very centre of your body and all your movements — whether swimming or otherwise — pass through here.
Jeffrey Willardson sums up swimming core strength in the book Developing the Core. He writes:
"Fast swimming relies on an athlete’s ability to simultaneously generate propulsive force with the arms and legs while attempting to minimize the drag resistance experienced as she knifes through the water.
"While total-body strength is important, the fastest swimmers are typically those who are able to effectively establish a streamlined body position in the water while also maintaining a base of support from which they can effectively generate propulsion with the arms and legs.
"Similar to most sports, core muscle conditioning through the torso is critically important to swimming performance."
Hannah Miley shares her favourite core exercises for swimmers
Olympian Hannah Miley has developed her own drills for improving her swimming core strength. She's shared them with us and has demonstrated them in the video above courtesy of Arena.
Miley has come up with two pool exercises which she says has played a huge part in developing her core strength and improving her efficiency in the water.
Swimming Core Strength - Exercise 1
- Start with a star float
- Move into a streamlined position
- Float and hold
HANNAH MILEY: "It may look quite simple. I start off with doing star float going into a streamlined position. It's a simple exercise, and if you can float really well, it does help your swimming. It means you've got less resistance, less drag, and makes you more efficient in the water."
Swimming Core Strength - Exercise 2
- Start with a star float
- Move into a streamlined position
- Rotate on to your side
- Float and hold
HANNAH MILEY: "I got to the point where doing a star float into a streamline position was starting to become quite easy, so I thought I'd challenge myself a little bit more and rotate and hold on my side.
"The challenge of holding yourself quite high in the water on your side is that it requires a lot of core control, a lot of stability and awareness of where your limbs are in the water.
"By lifting my arm up, and bringing my leg forward, and then rotating my hips, it just all adds to the challenge of trying to stay high in the water, and as still as possible, whilst completing the movement."
What are the benefits of these core workouts for swimmers?
By improving your core strength, you'll develop greater stability and balance in the water while also being able to maintain a more efficient streamlined body position.
Greater swimming core strength will also give you extra power, both in the arms for your pull and in the legs for your kick.
Miley has used her drills throughout a career that has seen her win Commonwealth, European and World gold medals, and says they are equally as effective for assessing fatigue.
Miley said: "It's a fun little drill that I've developed over the years. I find it really helps keep my efficiency going, and also I use it as a test for fatigue.
"If I feel my body is really fatigued, and I can't hold the core alignment, I find that I sink or that it becomes quite a jerky movement, so I try and keep things as smooth and as fluid as I possibly can.
"During taper it's a good indicator for me to see how ready and prepared and rested my body is."
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