Category: Pool equipment

Water Fitness Progressions

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fullsizeoutput_1e57   I like my class participants. Over the years I’ve heard about their families, their pets, their challenges, and which of my playlists they like. They are more than just class participants, they are friends. I want them to get a good, safe, effective workout every time they come to my class. I don’t want to bore them with the same old routines. I want to challenge them to progress in their levels of fitness. I want to help them make their hearts stronger, to give them an opportunity to improve their muscular endurance, to challenge them mentally, and I want them to have fun doing it.

This means I have to keep learning. That’s why I attend conferences, workshops, and webinars and read water fitness books and articles. One of the things I’ve been looking for is a system for offering progressions. One system that I learned about is periodization. It’s a training tool used by athletes to help them be in the best possible shape during the most challenging season of their sport. Periodization divides the year into 4 seasons, Preseason, Transition Season, Peak Fitness Season and Active Recovery. Why not use this tool to train for the sport of daily living?

My experiments with periodization have become the basis for my new book, Water Fitness Progressions, which has just been published.

Chris Book Cover

Each season has its own focus. In the Preseason we focus on improving posture, performing the exercises with good form, increasing range of motion, doing low intensity intervals, and using the properties of water to create overload. In the Transition Season we improve the quality of our movement by paying attention to how the arms and legs move the water, increase interval training to moderate intensity, and add equipment to sessions of strength training. In Peak Fitness Season we focus on increasing power, performing high intensity interval training (HIIT) and using both concentric and eccentric muscle actions in our strength training with equipment. In Active Recovery we give our bodies a chance to repair any microtrauma that may have occurred during the previous months. We do light cardio-respiratory training, core strength training and have fun activities such as games or relay races to provide a mental break.

The book explains how to do all of this, complete with lesson plans. Each interval lesson plan has 3 versions, a low intensity version, a moderate intensity version and a high intensity (HIIT) version. There are strength training lesson plans using various properties of the water, using buoyant and drag equipment, and focusing on eccentric muscle actions. There is also a section of fun activities.

Thanks to the American College of Sports Medicine, the Aquatic Exercise Association, Pauline Ivens and Stephanie Thielen, who all provided some of the ideas used in this book. My special thanks goes to my water fitness classes, who are my inspiration. The book can be ordered from Human Kinetics (the publisher) or from Amazon.com. Just click on whichever source you wish to order from and the link will take you there.

See you in the pool!

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Chris Alexander

choreography / deep water / Good Posture / Pool equipment / shallow water / water fitness  

Pool Tools: Noodles

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Noodles

Back when I started teaching water fitness in the early 1990’s, the only equipment we had was milk jugs, which we held under our arms for support during suspended exercises.

Milk jug  Milk jug  What was wrong with that? Plenty! When the body is suspended from milk jugs, the shoulders are unacceptably loaded, the tendons are pinched, and nerve damage may occur in the arm pits (Ivens and Holder, Do No Harm, 2011). Fortunately, today we have better equipment options.

One of the oldest and most popular options is the pool noodle. It is inexpensive (around $3 to $5 each) which means most facilities can afford them, and there are many ways to use them. One way is to use them under our arms for support during suspended exercises, just as we did with the jugs. But if we hang from noodles under our arm pits, we risk the same shoulder, tendon and nerve damage that occurred with the milk jugs. To avoid that risk, position the noodle below the shoulder blades with the arms resting on top of the noodle in a position called “posterior sling.”                                                                                                                                                                         Adam noodle kick

In this position, we can do kicks from the knees, flutter kicks, bicycle, leg press, seated jacks and ankle flexion. Alternate the legs or work only one leg. The kick from the knee, bicycle, leg press and ankle flexion can be performed with the legs in unison.  For the core muscles, you can do a seated waist twist, and recline backward for crunches.

Sit on the noodle like a swing to do most of those same exercises, and you have added a balance challenge because this position is less stable. You can not do crunches sitting on the noodle like a swing, but you can hike the hip side to side to work the obliques. Try holding on to the noodle with both hands, with just one hand or with arms extended to the sides. Place the arms inside the noodle or outside the noodle for arm movements. Sweep one arm either out or in to turn in a circle.

Kathy straddle noodle

When greater stability is desired, straddle the noodle as if riding a bicycle. All the leg movements you do with the noodle in a posterior sling can be done while straddling the noodle, including reclining for crunches. Squeeze the noodle between the knees to add resistance on the waist twist. Try crossing the ankles and using the arms only. Now you can row, do the breaststroke or reverse breaststroke, unison arm swing, clap hands, and rotator cuff sweep. Bicycle with both the arms and the legs. Bicycle races are a fun way to end a class.

More on noodles in my next post. See you in the pool!

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Chris Alexander

 

 

 

 

Pool equipment / shallow water / water fitness