 | While it is true that our body weight is supported in the water, that doesn't mean that we can't benefit from bodyweight exercises in the pool. Water buoyancy eliminates most of our weight in the water (depending on person's density) but not all of it. So we are still using some of our weight when we perform those exercises in the pool. In addition, water provides safe environment for our joints, which makes performing those exercises in the pool better than on dry land for people who are concerned with joint injuries. In this post we will discuss how to perform bodyweight exercises, how to increase body weight resistance in the pool and as usual provide some examples from our library. |
What's different about body-weight exercises in the pool is that it gives you more control over how much of your body weight you want to use. If you have knee injury for example and want to strengthen your quadriceps and you feel that squats on dry land would just make your injury worse, you can do water squats instead. This would create enough resistance to work your muscles with a safe amount of pressure on your joint. Whereas if you are healthy and fit and looking for a sufficient squat exercise, there are many ways to increase body weight resistance. For example:
- Performing one leg squats. This way your body weight would be placed on one leg only;
- By putting your arms above the water. This would decrease the body weight supported by the water;
- By holding an object above the water with both hands. By doing so you will place extra weight on your legs (you would feel the difference even if the object is not heavy);
- By doing single-leg squats while holding an object, or raising arms above the water.
- By doing faster squats in smaller range of motion. Go fast enough to feel more resistance in your muscles.
The same goes for other body-weight exercises in the pool. The following are some of the body-weight exercises from our library which you might find useful:
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