As we get closer to summer people start to complain that it is difficult to exercise with such intense heat and humidity. I don't want to single those people out because I am one of them. I don't use it as an excuse to not exercise though but will admit that it kind of takes a lot of the joy out of it when you can't see and your sunglasses are fogging up because you are soaking wet and dripping all over the footpath.
There is a simple solution and while I knew that swimming was good exercise anyway because just look at the body on your average swimmer, I didn't realize how many calories it burns even at an easy pace.
I love the goofy look on swimmers' faces and presume I look the same.
The other day I got a pass from a swim club to try out the pool fresh for the new season and figured I would give it a go because it is free. It won't be free later but I gave it a go. They tried to tell me that I had to wear a Speedo and boardshorts were not allowed but I told them that I will just not swim then and they changed their minds. What the hell?
Anyway, it's been many moons since I last went swimming but it isn't really something that you forget. I can do all the stroked but I find breaststroke the most relaxing because I don't like struggling for air. I decided to take it easy and use the program on my watch to track my heart rate and what not. I just wanted to see what sort of a workout I could get with 30 minutes of something that doesn't really even seem like a lot of work to me.
You may recall from a lot of the other things that I post that I feel as though the ticket to good health is to find some sort of exercise regimen that you do not hate and that way it won't seem like a real pain and therefore you don't shy away from doing it. For me, swimming breaststroke for 30 minutes is not hard, the worst part about it is that it kind of starts to feel a bit boring going back and forth with no change in scenery. If that is the worst part of your workout I think the workout is probably pretty ok.
I wasn't really impressed by the charts that I have seen online but I also know that the amount of calories burned by each person is going to be different depending on their own weight, age, and other factors.
I had my doubts about this amount of calories burned because it seemed really high but it is based on a real formula that is devised from science. The trick is, if someone isn't trying to sell you anything, they are probably telling the truth. Xiaomi stands to gain nothing by lying to me about this, but I still wanted to check behind them anyway.
According to a swimming calorie calculator devised by two PhD's my caloric burn is higher than average but still, it is plausible.
Here are my results as devised by a couple of scientists that once again, are not trying to sell you anything and their aren't even any adverts on their page.
So the readout from my watch might be a bit high but it still isn't wildly off target and is based on my weight, duration of the exercise and heart rate, therefore I kind of believe it.
So what the hell am I talking about anyway?
Well I am saying that this is fantastic news for me this summer and I may actually sign up for a membership to this swimming club as long as they never try to get me to wear a Speedo, ever again.
For me to burn 500 calories running, I have to make myself considerably more uncomfortable in summer than this rather medium-pace exercise where I going to be cooled off by the very water that I am exercising in.
Now the question is what sort of exorbitant rate are they going to be charging to have a membership here?