Is Swimming Good Training For HIking?

In this episode, I explore the effectiveness of swimming as part of a hiker's training and fitness, and share a few ideas about how to incorporate it into a training program. 

Swimming For HIking Fitness
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​Episode Transcript:

All right, hello, hello, guys. Today we are answering the question, is swimming good training for hiking? Now, this is a question which comes up surprisingly often when I'm working with new clients through Summit Strength. And one of the things that all my new clients go through when they first sign up with us is I go through a big questionnaire, which sort of dives into a whole bunch of things around how I can best fit the training around their life and their situation. And it asks them questions like how often a week they want to train, how much time they want to commit to that, what equipment they have access to.

But one really important question in there, is there anything that you love or hate doing? And quite often in this particular question, people will put down the answer that they really enjoy swimming, whether it's a part of their routine, whether it's something they've done in the past, or whether it's just something they really, really enjoy doing. And they put that in there, but also with the question, but I'm not sure if this is going to help my hiking. And it comes up all the time, so I figured I'd do a bit of an episode around this and just dive into my thoughts on this particular subject.

Now, my opinion on this is that swimming can be a really, really, really fantastic inclusion into a hiker's training program. And I think if it's something you enjoy and something that's accessible for you, it can be a really, really great inclusion and addition to your normal training. Now, to be clear, before I get into anything else, it shouldn't be the whole part of your program and saying that all you're doing to train yourself for hiking. It shouldn't be the majority. So you shouldn't be spending 50% of your week swimming, unless it's something you particularly love or something you're particularly training for, but it can be a really, really good addition. So doing a swimming session once a week or twice a week, if you're training loads, can be a really, really nice way of rounding out a particular program.

Now, when it comes down to programming swimming as training for hiking, there are a few different ways that I typically will use this for my hikers. And it really comes down to four different ways that I'll often use it. Now, number one, if someone enjoys swimming, if someone's competent at swimming and they're happy to swim for relatively longer periods of 20 minutes at a time or whatever it may be, and it's something they really want to include, it can be a great addition of long, lower intensity aerobic conditioning.

Now, as we've said in this podcast a million times, long duration, low intensity training should be the cornerstone of any hiker's preparation, and doing this type of training where you're working at constant paces for long durations is really going to be the best thing to help develop your cardiovascular capacity for the trail, to help you go for longer, to go for faster, to be more comfortable in certain sections. And this is the foundation that all your training should be built on. But saying this, you don't have to do everything on your feet. You don't have to do everything hiking or everything walking or whatever it may be. Using off feet options where you're not really just walking, but you're doing things that are long duration, low intensity, but not walking, can be a legitimate option.

And doing this as swimming can be really, really good. So essentially, if a swimmer is looking at doing this, I might add in one long duration session, and I would say, look, this week, I want you to go into the pool and I want you to swim constantly for 20 minutes, just resting when you need or whatever it may be. And then the next week after that, you're going to do 25, next week after that, 30, and just build up the duration, build, build, build, build, build just a little bit each week. And that can be a really, really simple way of incorporating swimming into your training.

Alternatively, if you're in a situation where you're like, okay, I don't really have the time availability to keep on building up, what you can do is you can say, okay, in a 40 minute period, you're going to try and get through. Keeping it at a low intensity and a comfortable intensity, you're going to get through as many laps as you can without getting absolutely exhausted. And then you're going to record that. Then next week, you're going to try and do one more. Then the next week, one more, and then slowly build up like that, or whatever it may be. But that's the first inclusion, just doing once or twice a week, long, lower intensity conditioning.

Now, before I move forward, this doesn't really matter what type of swimming you're doing here. So it could be freestyle. It could be backstroke. It could be breaststroke. It could be using a kickboard. It could be using fins or whatever it may be. Lots of people are better at certain strokes. Lots of people enjoy certain things. For myself, if I had to go out and swim for 30 minutes in a row, I would be hating life, so if I was going to do this, I probably would use fins and I probably would use a kickboard here and there and mix it up or whatever it may be. But it doesn't really matter. As long as you're moving at a constant pace for that duration, that's the main key there. So that's option number one, long, lower intensity conditioning.

The second thing that I often will use swimming for, and this is more for people who are pretty good swimmers, they don't have to be elite swimmers or anything like that, but they're pretty confident in their swimming ability. And this is using the swimming for shorter, higher intensity intervals. Now, as we, again, we've said on this podcast before, high intensity training does have its benefits for hiking, but you want to be doing it in a particular way. And I'm not a big fan of doing the whole 45 seconds on, 15 seconds off, and do 10 or so exercises in the gym that so many people do. I'm not a big fan of that.

But what I am a fan of doing for interval training is longing, or intervals that are two minutes, three minutes, four minutes, whatever it may be, and building up intervals like that. And I think that can be really, really valuable for a hiker's training. And if you are a competent swimmer, you can use these in the pool and you can do periods of higher intensity intervals. So you might say, okay, I'm going to swim for three minutes as quick as I can. And obviously timing in the pool is a little bit tricky. So you do a little bit of trial and error, and you'd see, okay, how many laps can I typically get through in three minutes? And you do that many laps, then you'd rest for a minute or two, or walk for a minute or two up and down the pool. And do that a number of times. That can be a really, really good addition into your training.

And then week by week, you'd either do longer intervals or quicker intervals or do more intervals or whatever it may be. And you could do that once a week. Now, this is particularly a good option for people who, they are restricted from doing higher intensity training in other things, because they might be uncomfortable. So if someone's got knee pain and they can't go on a bike and do bike intervals really quickly, if that feels uncomfortable for them, if they can do it in a pool, that can be a really good option. So you can get creative there, but that's another great option, higher intensity intervals in the pool.

Now, the third option and what I absolutely love, and this is for any hiker, it doesn't matter if you're a swimmer or not, but doing recovery work in the pool. And if you are training hard through the week, as we often say, recovery can be a crucial part of your program. And if you can incorporate a pool session once a week for 10, 15, 20, 30 minutes, whatever it may be, this can be an amazing method of recovery.

Number one, it's not going to put any impact through your joints because you [inaudible 00:08:05] obviously going through the water. Number two, apparently the hydrostatic pressure, which is the pressure that the water puts into the body, can be beneficial for recovery. And then number three, if you are actually in colder water and you're not in a heated pool, that can be beneficial, as well. You've got to be pretty brave in that situation.

But if you're using it as recovery work, it literally is just 10, 15, 20, 30 minutes of just gentle, gentle movement. So it's a gentle swim, changing up strokes, using fins, using a kickboard, whatever it may be. If you struggle with swimming, if you're not so good at it, you can build this out with walking. You can do one lap swimming, one lap walking up and down the pool, or you can just do the whole session walking, whatever it may be, but this can be a really, really good option, as well.

And then sort of tying into that, and the fourth way I like to use swimming as part of the hiker's training program, is if someone is having a flare up of pain or a flare up of discomfort, doing some sessions in the pool can be good just as a pain relief. So it's pretty similar to the recovery work in that sense. It's just gentle movement without any pressure through the joints. But if you are going through a flare up, this is often something I will recommend. And so if there is a hiker and they've been training hard and all of a sudden their knee starts getting uncomfortable and they can't get out for their normal walking sessions, they can't get out for whatever it may be, getting in the water and doing some swimming or doing some walking, it can be good for pain relief. And you can keep that up your sleeve if it's something you need to use.

But in all honesty, when it comes down to it, if you want to incorporate swimming as part of your training program, absolutely, I'm all for it, and I definitely, definitely recommend it if it's something you enjoy, but just make sure, keep it the top of the head. This shouldn't be an exclusion of your other parts that we often talk about on this podcast. So you still should be out getting hiking once in a while. You still should be getting out walking. You still should be doing your strength training, and then adding swimming on top of that. It can be a great addition.

So if you've ever wondered whether swimming can be a good training for hiking, it can be an awesome addition, it can be awesome inclusion, but it should never be in the majority. So don't feel guilty about adding it in on top of everything else you're doing, and it can do some really, really good things for your time on the trail. So hopefully that gives you a little bit of an insight into my thoughts around swimming as training for hiking. Hopefully that gives you permission, for any of the swimmers who may be thinking, oh, you know what, I'm missing my time in the pool, or maybe give you a few new ideas to give it a go if you haven't been swimming for a while.

So any questions off that, please do let me know. If anyone is interested in learning some few specific workouts for this, whether it's the pool walking workouts, whether it's the high intensity intervals, or whatever it may be. I would absolutely love if you came and found me in the Training for Hiking and Trekking Facebook group. Now, inside that group, I'm always happy to expand on these episodes, share extra workout ideas, share little routines, or whatever it may be. So if you're interested, come join the group, the Training for Hiking and Trekking Facebook group, post up a question in there, and I'm happy to explore anything you want.

So I'll leave the link for that in the show notes below, if you do want to join. But thank you very much for listening. I hope you got some value out of this today. Hope you enjoyed it, and we'll talk to you soon. Bye.

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