How to Do Water Exercise in Your Pool

Water exercise or water aerobics is an excellent low impact way to burn calories, improve flexibility and endurance, and firm muscles. You don't have to know how to swim to do these exercises and they are fun.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• comfortable swim suit
• If you keep up this exercise, you may want to get a pair of water shoes to protect your feet, but that's later -- once you are addicted to water exercise.

1. Wade into water to waist to chest deep water.

2. Warm up with some light jogging either "in place" or by moving around the pool.(5 minutes)

3. Work in a variety of moves, using the water's resistance to exercise your muscles. Try moves you are already familiar with such as
   1) jumping jacks (raising your arms only to the surface of the water.
   2) do the "twist" dance. Even if you are way too young to remember The Twist, you can do light jumps turning at the waist from side to side, pushing and pulling water with your arms.
   3) Cross-country ski move -- stationary or making progress across the pool. Push and pull the water with each arm stroke.
   4)Marching steps- knee up, leg out, pull back through the water, alternating legs in walking fashion.
   5) Side steps, with matching arms- legs and arms up to side, pulling through water to straight down position (This is the jumping jack movement without the jump).

4. Stay moving through the water, varying your moves and changing direction for approximately 20 minutes. You should feel like you are working, but you should not be so breathless that you cannot carry on a conversation.

5. You can increase effort with successive times in the pool. You can add flotation devices and add cycling legs, straddle open and close legs, and scissor kicks.

6. Be sure to cool down so that you are not stopping suddenly. Slow down to a slow walk or long stride step, until you feel that your pulse rate has returned to normal.

Tips & Warnings

• Moving your arms and legs through the water is the perfect exercise because this movement through the water is two-directional. You automatically exercise both muscles in the muscle pairs resulting in muscle balance.
• Vary the arm movements: straight arms, bent arms, pumping up and down arms, "S" shaped arms in pulling.
• As you move through the water with varying leg motions, be sure to press your heels to the bottom. In the words, make sure you are not doing all these movements on your toes.
• If your pool has deep water, rope off the area where the bottom drops down to deep water so that you can stay in shallow to mid- chest level, especially if you are not a swimmer.
• Do not exceed your level of comfort.