Tagged with ' Swim Suit'

If you already love swimming, you don’t need to be reminded about the benefits of the sport. If you’re a keen swimmer and are looking to take your practice to the next level you may want to consider competitive swimming. 

Whether you choose to train and compete in a club environment or continue solo is up to you. A club environment provides you with a community to interact with, get tips from and to build friendships within, while also giving you the structure to your training routines. A club can make a swim meet incredibly fun and exciting, spending a lot of time with your team and helping to support each other. 

Another great benefit of competitive swimming is the versatility in training, where you can choose between breaststroke, butterfly, and other techniques. Will you focus on a sprint or endurance event? 

You can also add training aids to help your sessions, such as kickboards or fins, that can test and push your technique, and challenge your ability to focus. Make sure to check out our range of training aids:

https://www.proswimwear.co.uk/swimming-accessories/swimming-training-aids.html

With a more dedicated schedule and more swim meets to attend, this means you will need competitive swimwear that is going to support you through your competitions. Investing in competitive swimwear will help to boost your performance, keeping you as streamlined as possible. The FINIS range of swimwear is designed to help swimmers by better improving their performance. Check out our FINA swimwear that we offer at ProSwimwear:

https://www.proswimwear.co.uk/fina-approved-swimwear.html?approval=284

Swimming can also help to boost your mood and focus, helping to improve mental health. Being a part of a club offers you support from like-minded swimmers. Swimming helps to decrease stress and anxiety, but in competitive swimming, you can increase your mental health from the benefits of this sport. Learn more about how swimming improves your mental health here:

https://www.proswimwear.co.uk/blog/how-swimming-can-improve-your-mental-health-/

It is important to train your mind, once you know that swimming has many health benefits and is a great exercise to keep you physically fit with a toned/lean body shape, competitive swimming does this and trains your mind too! Both your body and mind will be working at full capacity, it may help you focus on other areas of your life as well. 

We wish you the best of luck at your first swimming competition! Your first medal is just around the corner!

Having a sore back can be painful and annoying, even debilitating on some days. The everyday pressure onto your spine makes everyday tasks that little bit harder, or maybe even a lot harder to complete. Swimming can help to relieve some of that back pain naturally. Here’s why!

The water offers a release of stress and tension on the muscles. The buoyancy of the water supports your body weight, reducing the stress on your joints and spine. It can also help to calm the nervous system in your neck, back, and head. The water has a much lower impact on your spine than on other forms of exercise, removing the force of impact and making it less damaging to the spine. In water, your body moves slower and softer, allowing you to twist and turn in ways that aren’t possible on dry land.

• Some activities to try in the water to help your back could be to float face down like a jellyfish and gently letting the air out 
• Gliding through the water on the front of your body with a free neck, eyes on the pool floor and sweeping your hands through the water to create an effortless movement, and then regaining your feet, helps to stretch your back in a calm/fluid manner
• Rotating your back gently in the water, allows your back muscles to stretch and improve spine strength
• Swimming on your back can help to soothe the muscles, but if there is too much tension in the back of the neck and your pelvis, you may need to avoid this one.

Doing activities in the water that cause no stress or harm to the muscles and spine will most certainly help out back pain and help to prevent the pain from getting worse over time. Swimming is a full-body workout, that helps to stretch and exercise various muscles that you may miss in daily land training. 

Lots of people recommend swimming to help subdue some of that pain, so give swimming a try to see if it helps to relieve some of that back pain!

Swimming is a full-body workout. It requires the use of every muscle, meaning you need to care for and maintain each one. The upper body is important. Even if you have the strongest legs, a weak upper body will slow you down in the water.

Dryland training should be incorporated into your exercise for your swimming. Let’s delve into the different ways you can focus on your upper body strength to see those results in the pool!

Equipment-based exercises

Hopefully, your pool membership also includes access to a gym full of equipment to help train your arms. There are lots of gyms that have a lot of equipment to allow proper arm exercises for swimmers for example cables, free weights, and much more. Let’s take a look at some examples of equipment you can use for dryland exercises and a movement you can perform while using it: 

• Dumbbell curls are probably the first thing you visualise when you think about somebody training their arms, they are versatile and you can pick the weight depending on what it is you want to do. 
• You can also practice preacher curls which are one of the most effective isolation exercises, try three sets where you push yourself to failure and pick a weight where you are failing between 8-10 repetitions. 

Bodyweight exercises

You can build some serious muscle and endurance from just your own body weight. Don’t feel discouraged by the lack of dumbbells, you can still build muscle with bodyweight arm exercises. These exercises can also have a much lower chance of injury.

• Pushups are a classic. They don’t just improve your arm strength, it targets your chest, triceps, biceps, chest, and more! It can also improve core strength, which helps you to minimise your drag in the water. You can also turn pushups into full-body cardio by changing them into burpees. 
• To perform a pushup correctly, put your body into a high planking position and put your palms flat on the ground beneath your shoulders. Let your chest sink towards the ground until your nose touches the ground and then push yourself back up to the original position. Keep your feet close together, but not touching, your toes pointed, and your heels up. Pushups can be done in a variety of styles, such as diamond pushups, elevated pushups, and even one-armed pushups, which can make your workouts more fun and dynamic!
• Dips are one of the most essential arm exercises for swimmers as it helps to target strength building in your triceps. Put your legs at a 90-degree angle, and cross your calves. Lower your body, keep your chest forward to apply balance. Dips can be very hard at first and will make your triceps burn, but this exercise also targets your pecs, anterior deltoids, and even back muscles. 
• Chin-ups are performed by gripping a bar in line with your shoulders above your head, palms facing towards you. You then pull yourself up until your chin rises above the bar and lower yourself back down. Chin-ups also work out your lats and scapula. Chin-ups can be one of the most difficult arm exercises, especially if you are lifting a lot of weight. Resistance bands can help to push your body up. 

Dryland arm exercises for swimmers will make positive changes to your performance in the pool. If you have access to a gym, don’t be shy to try the weight machine! If you cannot access a gym, you can exercise at home with either equipment or simple bodyweight workouts! 

At Proswimwear, we offer a large range of resistance bands and dryland equipment that could help you with your workout.

Dryland Training Aids: https://www.proswimwear.co.uk/swimming-accessories/land-training.html
Resistance Training Aids: https://www.proswimwear.co.uk/swimming-accessories/swimming-training-aids/resistance-training.html

As race season is fastly approaching, it’s easy to get distracted by your child who is a confident swimmer that is preparing for the races, but what about your younger child that is still frightened of the water and is not confident in themselves? Here are some hints/tricks to help improve their confidence in the water.

Getting familiar with the water

For babies and toddlers, early swimming experience can be hit or miss, some children downright refusing to get into the water. The key is not to push the child to get into the water but to slowly introduce them to it. Take little steps with your little one, gradually getting them closer to the water. From sitting at the side of the pool to dipping their toes in the water, without taking them out of their comfort zone. Take your time to let them get comfortable with the sight of the water before they approach it.

Distract them from their fear

Think about what your child loves to play with, in the bath. Squirty toys? Floating ducks? Transfer these to your local swimming pool and get a family member to play with them enthusiastically - or your little one might want to join you! For children, water pistols provide an unprecedented level of excitement - especially when they receive an over-exaggerated reaction to being soaked. Pop one in their hands, ask them to gently squirt a willing victim, and stealthily move your child down a pool step further in the water.

Letting go - floating with buoyancy aids

When you’re in the pool with your child, they’ll happily splash around with the safety of your arms holding them. Let them build their confidence with this. Swish them around in the water, sing songs and nursery rhymes to get them feeling comfortable and happy. When you know they are ready (normally shortly after their first pool experience or weeks after), the next step is to let them float in the water, away from your arms. Buoyancy aids such as armbands and float vests will help your child float around in the water safely and independently. This should make the transition fun and easy.

Keep in mind, small babies do not have the control or stability that of an older child to float by themselves unsupported. If your child is under one or between 1-2 years old, make sure they have full support in the water.

Don’t forget to praise your child as they make progress. Never underestimate the encouragement that you give them. The cheers, compliments and support will have great power on their growing confidence.

Getting their faces wet

Even confident water-babies can find the thought of getting their faces wet, or putting them underwater, unappealing. If your child really hates getting wet, you should try to slowly familiarise them with water with games in the bath. When you’re in the pool why not help them become more confident when submerging their face by challenging them to a water-blowing contest? Just ask your child to blow bubbles on the surface of the water and make it fun. Goggles can help to encourage your child's underwater confidence while Dive Toys provide them with the incentive to take a peek underwater on the pool floor.

Building their swim confidence with pool games

Pool games are a great way for building both confidence and a love for swimming in the water. Go for themes you know your child will be excited by. This could be a mermaid game where they collect their shells from points around the pool. Chasing, racing, and dive games always prove popular and most children love to play with the inflatable animals as well as the foam noodles!

Let your imagination run wild to increase the fun in the pool!

Don’t forget at Proswimwear, we have a large range of swimming aids to help your child in the water including kickboards, floatation devices such as armbands, and fun pool toys to increase your child's curiosity and confidence in the water.

Proswimwear Training Aids 

https://www.proswimwear.co.uk/swimming-accessories/swimming-training-aids.html?product_list_limit=60

Follow our guide explaining how to care for your FINIS Rival 2.0 race suit, as worn by Olivia Smoliga.

Read on to discover our 6 care tips, including:

- Drying

- Storing

- Wear & Tear

By following these simple steps, you could extend the life of your race suit, so you can keep on swimming!