Water Fitness

Need low impact exercise for your individual fitness program? Water fitness aka aquatic fitness may be the answer for you.

Water is a good all around fitness medium for many reasons:

• Buoyancy - lessens the gravitational forces and makes your movements easier and your body feels lighter.

• Resistance - is changeable at all times in the water depending on the surface area (shallow water or deep water), the force exerted and the speed of the movements.

• Healing properties - the soothing warm water temperature naturally helps increase mobility and reduce pain levels as well as increase range of motion.

Water fitness may use a variety of tools to help enhance your body's balance, stability, coordination, flexibility, endurance, speed and agility, as well as strength and weight loss. Water fitness is a very beneficial for the exercise and/or healing of muscles and joints. Franklin D. Roosevelt used water exercise and therapy for the rehabilitation of his polio during the 1920's. Even the ancient Greeks and Romans used hot baths for healing as well as recreation. I remember as a youth watching swimming instructors working with people of all ages, with many different physical problems and thinking “They can’t do other things on land but they are able to do it in the water – that’s cool”.

A good water workout program can be used by all people no matter what their age or what their stage.