Swimming is a great way to increase your muscular strength and endurance. More commonly viewed as a cardiovascular workout, swimming is still a great way to tone your muscles. You may be wondering what muscles it works. These are the muscles used in swimming.
Muscles Used in Swimming
The muscles used in swimming largely depend on what stroke you are doing in the water. Certain strokes utilize some muscles more than others. However, you’ll start to notice commonalities in all four of the following swimming strokes.
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Swimming Breaststroke Muscles
Breaststroke is a great form of exercise. It’s challenging because it requires a lot of rhythmic movement from your arms and legs. Therefore, it works a lot of different muscle groups. So what muscles does breaststroke use?
Breaststroke uses upper body muscles including the latissimus dorsi (back muscles), pectoralis major (chest muscles), biceps and triceps (arm muscles), brachialis, brachioradialis, and deltoids (shoulder muscles). Some of the leg muscles used during breaststroke include glutes (butt muscle), quads (thigh muscles), and your gastroc and soleus (calf muscles). You use a lot to these muscles in day-to-day actions like walking, going up the stairs, and pulling things towards you.
Read our blog to learn more about swimming the breaststroke.
Swimming Freestyle Muscles
The freestyle, or front crawl, swimming stroke uses a lot of arm movement to power you through the water. The flutter kick is also used so some leg muscles are also activated. Therefore, you’ll primarily activate muscles like the triceps, biceps, quadriceps, and hamstrings.
We’ve broken down the stroke into its various movement segments, which are kicking, reach, catch, pull, push, and recovery. Your core is engaged throughout this stroke as well, which is great for toning the abdominals and obliques.
Part of Stroke
Movement
Muscles Used
Daily Activities Used
Kicking
Kicking Down Quadriceps Thighs Walking Tibialis Anterior Shins
Running
Kicking Up
Hamstrings Thighs Stepping up
Gastrocnemius
Calves
Pointing your toes
Reach
Obliques
Abs
Twisting your body
Triceps Brachii Arms
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Opening a door
Latissimus Dorsi Lower Back Pulling something towards you
Rotator Cuff
Shoulder
Swinging your arms
Catch
Deltoid
Shoulder Raising your hand
Extensor Digitorum
Forearm Pointing your fingers Triceps Brachii Arm
Shooting a basketball
Brachioradialis Arm
Twisting your arm
Pull
Latissimus Dorsi
Back Pull- ups/ Chin-ups
Brachioradialis
Arm Bending at the elbow Triceps Brachii Arm
Push Ups
Trapezius Shoulder
Shrugging your shoulders
Push
Trapezius
Upper Back
Rowing
Latissimus Dorsi
Mid/lower Back Bent over row Deltoids Shoulder
Crossing arm over body
Rectus Abdominus
Abs Crunches Obliques Abs
Shoveling
Recovery
Deltoid
Shoulder Getting a box from a shelf
Brachioradialis
Arms Hitting a tennis ball Trapezius Shoulder
Elliptical
Obliques Abs
Rotating your body
To learn more about the technique on how to perform the freestyle swimming stroke, check out our blog.
Swimming Backstroke Muscles
The backstroke uses a lot of the same muscles as the freestyle, but it also counters some of those movements. The reverse arm movement activates more of the deltoids (shoulders) and latissimus dorsi (the large muscles that extend across your back). Remember to keep that core engaged as well!
Because the flutter kick is virtually identical as in freestyle, you will activate your glutes, quads, hamstrings, and anterior tibialis (shin muscles) in your legs.
The video below shows that the backstroke is almost like an upside down version of freestyle.
Learn more about the backstroke here.
Swimming Butterfly Muscles
Butterfly is a very physically demanding stroke. To master the butterfly, you need to coordinate the timing of your pull/push arm movements with your dolphin kick (more information on the technique for butterfly can be found here).
This swim stroke utilizes a wide variety of muscles. Some of the more dominant ones include your abdominals, quads, pecs, hamstrings, glutes, deltoids, and lats.
Given all that swimming can do for your muscles, you can see it’s an excellent form of exercise. A summary of muscles used in swimming for the four strokes can be found below.
Source: https://t-tees.com
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