When you’re recovering from a physical injury, low-impact exercise is going to be your best friend. One of the best low-impact exercises you can invest in is swimming. While the following explains why we recommend swimming, before you start a new exercise routine after an injury it’s always important that you visit your primary care physician and/or North Platte Physical Therapy to get the help you need.

The Benefits
We’ve already discussed the benefits of swimming as it relates to low-impact exercise. Swimming also keeps your body from feeling a lot of pressure. While you will be exerting a lot of effort, the buoyancy of the water allows for you to have an effective no-weight workout. As a form of exercise, swimming can help reduce stress, improve your mood, increase your strength, and your cardiovascular endurance. Swimming will also help increase flexibility and improve your aerobic endurance. In addition to improving your overall fitness, swimming can be a powerful tool to help lose weight. 

The Focus
Swimming truly utilizes all muscle groups. You’ll workout your core, arms, legs, back, and glutes which makes for the perfect full body workout. the best part is that while swimming will give you a full body workout, it won’t harm your joints or put any additional stress. 

Getting Started
Swimming will give you a great workout - we recommend aiming to swim approximately two and a half hours a week in thirty minute blocks. When you first start your workout routine, you probably won’t be able to complete a full thirty minute block but that’s completely okay. You can start slow and steady, eventually working yourself up to a thirty minute workout. 

When starting a swim workout, you won’t need anything but a swimsuit and some goggles. For those with longer hair, you might want to also look at a swim cap to help keep your hair from being severely damaged by the chlorine. You can look into adding additional equipment such as a kick board, pull buoy, or paddles to add additional variety to your workout.

Swimming can be as intense as you’d like, it’s all about how hard you are willing to push yourself. When you are first starting out, it can be tempting to give it your all, but slow and steady will win the race. You want to keep coming back to participate in your workout, and you will be very sore after your first day.

Are you ready to receive additional help managing your physical therapy recovery? Contact us today, we can help. Our team of professionals will implement a safe, effective, and reasonably-priced treatment plan that will have you living better, whether that means sleeping more soundly or getting through your work day without pain. Patients across Wyoming and Western Nebraska have relied on North Platte Physical Therapy for their pain prevention and physical recovery needs for years.