AQUA RUNNING

I missed a period of 2 weeks through injury. I just did aqua jogging during this period, when I came back I felt as if I'd lost no fitness.

I would advice you to get a floatation belt.

You may even gain fitness.

I was hurt in college and had to run in the pool for about a month. I was convinced that I would loose fitness so I worked twice as hard as I did before I was hurt. If I was planned to do a 45 minute run, I would do 90 minutes. If I was supposed to do 10 x 400, I would do 20 x 60 secs as hard as I could go.

thanks for the help

Why not just break down and start swimming? That way you can maintain your fitness at the same time as increasing your range of motion, developing a little upper body strength, stretching out your spine, developing a new skill and getting to hang out in a Speedo with like minded individuals.

Aqua aerobics is kinda like gym aerobics, its useless when you become shipwrecked and need to get to the life raft...what are you going to do yell out "Don't worry, I'm really, really good at aqua aerobics!" C'mon take the plunge...

i'd say it's invaluable, but becomes quite tedious after more than 3 weeks. switch it up with other types of cross training, if your injury allows it. i used recumbent bikes, stationary bikes, elliptical machines, weight lifting, drills, etc to stay in shape. definitely don't just sit around for 8 weeks, you'll regret it!

good luck with the injury!

Jefe in the CO wrote:

Why not just break down and start swimming? \.

'cause "aqua running" is more similar to running than swimming is, right? i wouldnt say that it is useless at all. Plenty of people have bounced back in BETTER shape than they were before the injury. Just make sure that you "run" with the same form/exaggerated form as you use outside on the real ground (pay careful attention to your turnover and range of motion)

Yes, it works wonders!

Make sure you do it right, however. Keep your legs fairly long and extended (like running). Keep the cadence high and use your feet kind of like flippers and try to feel the resistance through the water.

Many people take big long slow overexagerated strides in the water. That's not what you want to do.

I think it can be really beneficial if you are injured. I like to mix it up with the excercise bike, just to save on the boredom.

Do what other posters have said, keep your form as close to running as possible. Do repetitions. I used to do something like 5 mins hard with 30 secs easy for an hour or something like that, because it will raise your heart rate and it will also make the workout a little more challenging, and thus less boring. You don't need much of a recovery at all in between reps. This is way better for you than just "running" easy in the pool for an hour.

I would try to do an hour in the pool and then an hour on the excercise bike every day. Keep your head in the game and when you can start to run again you'll still have alot of fitness.

jack it wrote:

Jefe in the CO wrote:

Why not just break down and start swimming? .

'cause "aqua running" is more similar to running than swimming is, right? i wouldnt say that it is useless at all. Plenty of people have bounced back in BETTER shape than they were before the injury. Just make sure that you "run" with the same form/exaggerated form as you use outside on the real ground (pay careful attention to your turnover and range of motion)

Wrong. The act of attempting to mimic running in the pool is no where near the same as running. It is more like "aqua cycling". The only real purpose of aqua running is to maintain your cardiovascular fitness by doing something that your body vaguely recognizes and provide some semblance of range of motion work. You can get much better cardiovascular fitness by including upper body and breath control work that swimming provides than you do "aqua running". These more than compensate for the range of motion stuff you get from aqua cycling...

I will give you that swimming is not easy just to pick up but that's the fun part of not being able to run. Join a masters swim team, set some new PR's, develop a competetive outlet and you will stay in the game much better on a mental level than just doing something that makes you look like an idiot...

I say this because I did some aqua running in my day and chucked it after 1 week because I wanted to shoot myself. I joined a masters swim team (mostly trihackaletes) learned how to swim and got pretty fit because swimmers do intervals every day. I came back really fit and mentally focused. Now that running's over except, for jogging, I'm still a competetive swimmer. And thank god I'm not relegated to one of those aqua aerobics classes...

Didn't Salazar swim instead of Aqua run back when he was injured?

didnt salazar have rupp in the aqua jogger?

aqua jogging is definitely the best thing you can do for x training. swimming is a really good workout but it does nothing as far as being specific to the running muscles and what not. once i came back from injury and began running for a coiuple weeks and like always when i first start running i feel like crap like i've never ran before. it only took like 3 days aqua jogging over one weekend to get me used to the running motion again so that suddenly after those 3 days i felt fine running. i am personally just starting to do a ton of cross training as i come back from a long series of injuries. i'm going to be doing aqua jogging, biking, and elliptical. no swimming. i think a combination of those 3 things should give the best development for running as far as cross training goes. swimming would be a good strengthening exercise but i suck at swimming and would much rather spend my time aqua jogging to help out my running rather than learning how to swim well.