Is swimming good for running?

V$ wrote:

I agree with this. My kid has a bigger engine then her body can handle sometimes and has experienced miner problems with calf and ankle issues. We are doing our best to incorporate more running into her training.

Make sure she wears a good headlamp, although mines are hard on the lungs as well.

anyone ever hear of a kickboard? no real swimmers on this forum

lease wrote:

Local burn out wrote:

...right now she just wants to swim and dance, which is fine w/me.

Two things:

1. If her dancing is classical/ballet or her swimming focuses on breast stroke, she's likely to develop a turnout that doesn't necessarily transfer to running very well. Not a major concern, but something to be alert to.

2. Do what you can to keep her in a mix of activities. Research has shown that early specialization limits future performance levels. If the swimming emphasis gets to be a year-round kind of thing, that's not good for her future development--even as a swimmer!

Wow, great observations and insights. Her dancing is ballet & jazz, though she will have to give up jazz if she stays w/competitive swim next year, and her favorite stroke is the breaststroke, though I am trying to emphasize the importance of her being well rounded.

As far as other activities, there is no interest besides running or riding her bike occasionally. I'm not going to push the running at this age, because I believe parents who do that are "buying problems" later in the child's life, hence the limiting it to one or maybe two days per week. Not really sure what else to do, but that seems like plenty.

To the poster who suggested swimming may improve flexibility, I hope so for her sake. I know it helps w/core.

Black lung wrote:

[quote]V$ wrote:

Make sure she wears a good headlamp, although mines are hard on the lungs as well.

LOL

Local burn out wrote:

Wow, great observations and insights. Her dancing is ballet & jazz, though she will have to give up jazz if she stays w/competitive swim next year, and her favorite stroke is the breaststroke, though I am trying to emphasize the importance of her being well rounded.

The key thing to remember is that if she ever wants to just run, she is going to be really strong on the cardio side but still need a slow build up on the muscles in order not to be constantly injured. the dancing now will help, but kids who swim competitively then get into running are really strong but the running muscles are not.

slow and steady will be key.

moanswers wrote:

Local burn out wrote:

Wow, great observations and insights. Her dancing is ballet & jazz, though she will have to give up jazz if she stays w/competitive swim next year, and her favorite stroke is the breaststroke, though I am trying to emphasize the importance of her being well rounded.

The key thing to remember is that if she ever wants to just run, she is going to be really strong on the cardio side but still need a slow build up on the muscles in order not to be constantly injured. the dancing now will help, but kids who swim competitively then get into running are really strong but the running muscles are not.

slow and steady will be key.

Ill say the same thing with a slightly different twist. I'd be worried about the joints/bones/tendons/ligaments. She might start running and say "wow, running is so easy. I've never really run before and I can already run do mile runs like they are nothing." .......boom, stress fracture.

That might be an extreme example, but you get the idea

I used to swim a lot with training and I could not take it. Legs felt dead on workout days and times were skewed. Not for me

big kick wrote:

anyone ever hear of a kickboard? no real swimmers on this forum

What are you going on about? I am a real swimmer, but why would i randomly mention kickboards?

You must still be drunk from New Years.

I've been on some sort of swim team for as long as I can remember, and have always found some way to integrate an extra form of aerobic work into my weekly cross country and track training plan (at the knowledge of my coach of course) whether it be swim 2-3 times a week with my school team or my old year-round team, and I can say the added workouts have furthered my abilities for the better.

Specificity. Swimming is good for swimming. Running is good for running.

My 12 year old daughter has been a competitive (year around) swimmer since she was in kindergarten. She's loved it! She also plays soccer. I convinced her to run xc this year for her 7th grade middle school team. She won almost every race. Her 3200 PR is a 12:13. The only running she's done In her life was from soccer. She did run some with her school xc team starting this season but had to miss Many practices because of swimming and soccer. It was too tiring when she had a three practices in one day. Most of her time was spent in the pool!

I'm convinced swimming and everything she learned(pushing herself, discipline, competition, fitness) was the main reason she did well this season.. If your daughter doesn't love ball sports or anything that incorporates some running i'd definitely get her into a year around competitive swimming program. Especially since she loves it!

And if she's a talented runner she will figure it out in time. My daughter absolutely loved swimming. but she decided at the end of this xc season that running is her true calling. It was a difficult decision but she has decided to give up swimming to focus on running. Hopefully her running won't suffer now. Good luck!

Former swimmer. She's in 5th grade. if she loves swimming, let her swim -- if you make her run and she ends up hating it, you have a burnout doing no sports. Swimming is fun, social, low-risk/impact, will keep her in good shape, give her an aerobic base, introduce her to basic conditioning, teach her to push herself in training mentally, and develop a lot of muscles not used in running.

See how it goes for the next few years, and just keep opportunities to run on the table - if there's a casual or offseason youth running program, doing family 5ks, encouraging her to go out for a school team when it's time - that sort of thing.

If you really are looking out for potential future athletic hazards presented by this unexpected interest, the only real one is that swimmers in general tend to be a lot more snotty than runners in my experiences. I preferred swimming, but I always hung out with mostly runners.

Former swimmer here too (UC school)

2 things: slim to none overlap between swimming and running in either direction

It appears the daughter 'loving swimming' doesnt matter to ex-runner/OP dad. Good luck with that

gggeerg wrote:

If you really are looking out for potential future athletic hazards presented by this unexpected interest, the only real one is that swimmers in general tend to be a lot more snotty than runners in my experiences. I preferred swimming, but I always hung out with mostly runners.

Snotty = mature with taste and class?

Local burn out wrote:

Is swimming good conditioning for, ultimately, "would be" runners in high school or is it merely just good for swimming?

I swam summer YMCA league age 7-16, breaststroke my best stroke. Small team, 8 kids. Later bigger teams. Rode my bike a lot. Age 13, my family moved 5 miles away. I swam a.m. with my new team, ran 3 miles before lunch, then biked to the old neighborhood about 5 days/week, swam more, played pickup sports, biked home p.m. Started lifting weights and doing 30 mile bike rides (old style toe clips), focusing on breaststroke. Last 3 weeks of summer I would bike 10 hilly miles to soccer practice, run in that, then bike home. My biking style was low gearing with quick tempo 110-120 rpm peddling tempo.

That all worked very well together, I had fun, and I still run, swim, and bike with great enjoyment today at age 56.

For your kid, let her do some pool bottom running with shoes in chest deep water, forwards & backwards, for maybe 30 minutes as a fun bridge to running. Take the shoes off at the end and do super quick tempo running in place in the pool, pumping the arms & legs.

Use cycling and some running to integrate the neural patterns of the sports. Keep it creative & fun!

Thank you for the feedback. She sounds like she has a good amount of talent. I strongly suspect that soccer and swimming together might be the best "setup" for kids as they get older, though, if my kid had an interest in soccer, I would think that would be about one of the most enjoyable sports to play through high school.

But I strongly suspect my daughter will go down the same path as yours. How much did she swim? Right now, we are on a team that only swims M & F and every other W, with about one meet per month.

Thanks. I would tend to agree. Right now, she is swimming up to three nights per week, doing two days of dance, and one day of running. It's a good balance, and she seems to enjoy it, and I think the day off is important. But, it seems her true passion is swimming right now, so we may end up joining a club that practices more in lieu of dance, since her interest seems to be waning there.

Sit and kick wrote:

Former swimmer here too (UC school)

2 things: slim to none overlap between swimming and running in either direction

It appears the daughter 'loving swimming' doesnt matter to ex-runner/OP dad. Good luck with that

Former D1 runner here too (UC school), though I felt no need to mention that til now as it sounds totally douchy.

Two things: The vast majority of posters disagree w/you, and I was beaten at state by a swimmer/runner, so I strongly suspect swimming helps.

You couldn't be more wrong. We have given her adequate opportunities to find her passion. If it's swimming, then great. She has an uncle who was a long distance swimmer, so he may help her cultivate her talent there. She just happens to be pretty good at running on minimal training, jogging once per week for about 20 min really.

Local burn out wrote:

Is swimming good conditioning for, ultimately, "would be" runners in high school or is it merely just good for swimming?

I was a collegiate swimmer, ran track in the spring because I liked it and seemed to be good at it. Took up track seriously following my undergrad years as a swimmer. That being said, swimming is very good if you're a decent or good swimmer. Unfortunately a lot of people are so inefficient in the water that it does not really do them that much good from a cardiovascular perspective, its primary benefit if not injured, so it wouldn't help their running all that much.