I have determined that when I swim, based on my heart rate, I am burning an enormous amount of calories. The other day, I wore my HR monitor and based on my average HR, time spent swimming, and my weight, I burned 1053 calories. Now, the next day, I ran for 40 minutes and burned 453 calories.
I have noticed that when I just swim over a number of weeks, my LDL cholesterol readings go up and my body fat goes up as well. When I just run and don't burn as many calories (according to my HR monitor) my LDL drops, my HDLs go up, and my body fat decreases. I've noticed this now over the course of 13 years.
Anybody know of any studies out there that might explain this? Why would an activity such as swimming that obviously burns a bunch of calories cause an increase in body fat?
Sorry, the only thing that will increase the levels of fat in your body is if you consume (eat and/or drink) more calories per day than your body burns. Other than that, your options are having fat cells injected into your body but that seems kinda pointless.
Paul
Puff and I aren't talking about scientific percentages of fat, Hulk. And, Mary, just for the record, we are not remotely fat or overweight and aren't saying swimming makes you a huge blob. We're just saying we're bigger and weigh more as swimmers than as runners. I've heard many women complain of this phenomenon.
Puff and I aren't talking about scientific percentages of fat, Hulk. And, Mary, just for the record, we are not remotely fat and aren't saying swimming makes you a huge blob. We're just saying we're bigger and weigh more as swimmers than as runners.
That is because swimming reduces levels of VISCERAL fat (the fat that surrounds your organs) as opposed to sub-cutaneous fat (the fat that rides just below your skin). And because swimming operates at a much better aerobic/anaerobic balance than running, swimming does not canabalize nearly as much muscle mass as running does.
I don't think it's a fact that swimming makes you fat, and running makes you skinny. This article studied the effects of long term swimming programs on healthy and diabetic girls 14-19 years old.
CONCLUSION: Long-term swimming program improved aerobic capacity, reduced body fat mass in all participants, and reduced high-density lipoprotein levels only in healthy subjects.This article in the Journal of Sports Science and Medicine studied masters swimmers ages 25-71. It focused on men, but it mentions women a few times that are relevant to this discussion.
In addition, when assessed using body mass index scores, members of this group of swimmer athletes were less likely to be overweight or obese as compared to the average U.S. male (Freid et al., 2003; National Center for Health Statistisc, 2004).
Regional adiposity measurements also suggested that these swimmers were leaner than the average American male. Mean waist circumference was smaller than the National average of 96.3 cm (National Center for Health Statistics, 2004). Subcutaneous fat deposits estimated from skinfold thickness were also smaller (Statistics, 2004).
However, it also mentions that while masters swimmers are less likely to be overweight and are typically leaner than the average Americans, there is a definite relationship between swimming and a larger abdomen:
In these adult male athletes, age was associated with a trend toward greater thickness in the lower abdomen, but not with the amount of weekly swim training distance. A positive relationship between increased abdominal thickness and age was also noted in female masters swimmers (Tuuri et al., 2002).
So, I think it's not so much that you're getting fatter as the fat is moving around.
I've been doing more aerobic work in the pool lately.
... swimming operates at a much better aerobic/anaerobic balance than running …
Maybe someone can help me better understand the definitions of "aerobic" and "anaerobic."
In my mind, I go back to the beginning of this thread – the heart rate monitors. The most effective range for burning fat is what I would call an "aerobic" range; in this range, the heart rate is below the lactate or anaerobic threshold – by this definition, "aerobic" work does not mean the swimmer is achieving the highest heart rate possible. In contrast, as I understand it, the most effective range for building fast-twitch muscles (that is, the training range that is most effective for building speed and other things that it takes to win a short race – but also for creating an appetite for food rather than for burning fat) is above the "anaerobic" threshold (and you’ll know you’re in that range by checking your heart rate and comparing it to, say, a T-30 swim). Right?
This all seems more complicated by the fact that an identical level of "aerobic" or "anaerobic" work will produce different heart rates when you are running versus when you are swimming. The heart rate for a comparable amount of work in the water will be lower than when you are running around a track. Again, right?
Maybe someone can help me better understand the definitions of "aerobic" and "anaerobic."
In my mind, I go back to the beginning of this thread – the heart rate monitors. The most effective range for burning fat is what I would call an "aerobic" range; in this range, the heart rate is below the lactate or anaerobic threshold – by this definition, "aerobic" work does not mean the swimmer is achieving the highest heart rate possible. In contrast, as I understand it, the most effective range for building fast-twitch muscles (that is, the training range that is most effective for building speed and other things that it takes to win a short race – but also for creating an appetite for food rather than for burning fat) is above the "anaerobic" threshold (and you’ll know you’re in that range by checking your heart rate and comparing it to, say, a T-30 swim). Right?
This all seems more complicated by the fact that an identical level of "aerobic" or "anaerobic" work will produce different heart rates when you are running versus when you are swimming. The heart rate for a comparable amount of work in the water will be lower than when you are running around a track. Again, right?
This must be the link. I think I go hard in the pool and have my HR over the AT level quite a bit. For example, one time when I got really carried away, I did 12 x 150 free on 2:00 and tried to hold 1:45 on each one. When I finished, I took my HR with my finger at the neck and I was at 220. No joke!
In running or biking, except when I am doing speed work, and that only used to happen once a week, I would keep my HR fixed in the aerobic zone for periods of between 30 minutes to 120 minutes.
So, what I am wondering is if constantly training in an anaerobic state results in more fat storage while training in the aerobic state results in fat-burning.
For health reasons, I really am thinking about going back to triathlon training. I could eat horribly - baked goods a couple times a day and still have LDLs just around 101 and HDLs up around 70. It's much easier for me to add exercise than cut out the sweets. This will be a problem as I get older as I won't always be able to do tris. I've decided that if I can't run or bike, I'll just walk 2 hours a day and of course, still swim.
I find that I lose more weight while running as opposed to swimming. I am not a very skilled runner and I swam age group, in high school and in college. That being said, I much prefer swimming and supplement it with some cross country skiing, weights, yoga, hiking and rare runs. For me, it's much more about eating a reasonable diet. If I eat mostly healthfully, and workout 5+ days a week, no weight issues.
Running makes me skinny and swimming makes me fat.
Same for me. Swimming=Big Tank or Running=Thin :doh: Looking forward to moving to NZ and switching from swimming to running.
I have to agree with the original post and a number of the other posts here. All throughout my swimming career, if I needed to lose some pounds, I found I needed to either run or ramp up the weight lifting.
I have a hypothesis that is based on complete conjecture and absolute no reading of scientific articles: Running and lifting weights are HARD whereas swimming is easy. Granted, fast swimming is not easy, but I feel far more fatigued after trying to run a mile than after trying to swim a mile ... even if I ramp the intensity to high on both. My belief is that, since I'm a pretty efficient swimmer, switching to a different activity like running engages very different muscle systems that are inefficient and burn more fat.
I've recently knocked off about 10 pounds (low 200s to low 190s) by mainly adding running back into my training routine ... of course, this week, my knees hurt so much that I couldn't kick breaststroke, so I guess I'll just gain the weight back again:sad:
Hmm...well, if you are adding extra activity..that increases your caloric burn--therefore: more weight loss. Are you subtracting the equivalent amount of swimming activity or just adding in the running/weight lifting? So of course any additional activity is going to increase your caloric burn.
It is true that your body rapidly adjusts to exercise and becomes more efficient. When you keep your body guessing it burns more calories and therefore more weight loss.
This whole discussion is interesting to me because I am overweight and I am losing weight (slowly but surely) since I started swimming regularly back in late August. I exercise most days at lunch (elliptical, weight training..that kind of thing) but the scale never budged. Now it's moving down. I think it's just the additional swimming burning more calories. I didn't start up swimming again to lose weight. I needed to lose, but I started back up because I missed it and I love it and I enjoy exercise.
I mean, one's definition of fat and skinny is very subjective. Personally, I just don't think you can tell someone swimming will MAKE you fat.
