Water running a good leg/lower body workout?

Was wondering if anyone here has experience with water running? Yesterday was killer hot and today as well, so I decided to run in the pool, the shallow end. It is a small pool and after about 5 laps, maybe a 30 foot circle at different speeds, I start generating a current so reversed direction. Fighting that current took some effort! It certainly seemed more of a muscular than an aerobic workout - my HR never got over 100 - and I did 2*25 laps. I broke it with swimming 25 sprinting lengths which was overall

an invigorating full body workout on a hot, hot day!

My legs and arms felt heavy early the next day (today) but have lightened since then.

Reading http://www.humankinetics.com/excerpts/e ... er-running it seems that deep water running is more of an aerobic workout perhaps as there's less of a pause with no bottom contact. No push-off is possible. My pool is a bit shallow for that though. Studies of deep water running I believe show that it is good enough to maintain running performance though not improve it. I beleve it's more used for rehab purposes?

Which do you think would be a better muscular lower-body workout, shallow or deep?

Meh. Having done it in my baseball years (because Nolan Ryan was known for it), I'd say it's an interesting form of conditioning but not a go-to exercise for developing strength or power.

Blairbob said:

Meh. Having done it in my baseball years (because Nolan Ryan was known for it), I'd say it's an interesting form of conditioning but not a go-to exercise for developing strength or power.

Interesting!

Yeah, it's a change of pace if nothing else. It's muscular endurance if related to strength development.

It did leave my legs and calves especially more limber than usual though which was pleasant.

I heard of 400m sprinters and probably 200m sprinters doing some running in the pool for rehab after some injuries and then gaining a new PR in their race after recovery.

B1214N said:

I heard of 400m sprinters and probably 200m sprinters doing some running in the pool for rehab after some injuries and then gaining a new PR in their race after recovery.

That would be sweet!

The last two times I tried sprinting I pulled a quad and then a calf muscle. Now I'm gun shy.

Maybe will do water work a few more times and give it a third chance!

I did run 5 miles the day before yesterday and it felt good, whereas I felt tugging and

stopped early when I had tried that distance prior to water running. It's hard to say it was the water, since

"time heals all wounds" but it may have been a factor!

BTW, wear water shoes are you will chew up your feet good.

Blairbob said:

BTW, wear water shoes are you will chew up your feet good.

Will look at that. It's a vinyl/sand pool bottom so not too gritty or anything. A bit slippery in fact. Not sure I'd want to gain traction and risk tearing it though. Hmm...

FutureisNow said:

B1214N said:

I heard of 400m sprinters and probably 200m sprinters doing some running in the pool for rehab after some injuries and then gaining a new PR in their race after recovery.

That would be sweet!

The last two times I tried sprinting I pulled a quad and then a calf muscle. Now I'm gun shy.

Maybe will do water work a few more times and give it a third chance!

I did run 5 miles the day before yesterday and it felt good, whereas I felt tugging and

stopped early when I had tried that distance prior to water running. It's hard to say it was the water, since

"time heals all wounds" but it may have been a factor!

You have to build slowly into real sprinting. It is an extremely high force activity all over the lower body in flexion AND extension, so you need to actually run some SSC with specific sprint speeds and only speed up a little bit each cycle, and be progressive about the way you increase the speed as you enter into full-on sprinting at 100%, which should really be built up to over 4-6 months or more, depending on how long it has been since you regularly were able to sprint @ 100% speed without injuries building up.

Joshua Naterman said:

FutureisNow said:

B1214N said:

I heard of 400m sprinters and probably 200m sprinters doing some running in the pool for rehab after some injuries and then gaining a new PR in their race after recovery.

That would be sweet!

The last two times I tried sprinting I pulled a quad and then a calf muscle. Now I'm gun shy.

Maybe will do water work a few more times and give it a third chance!

I did run 5 miles the day before yesterday and it felt good, whereas I felt tugging and

stopped early when I had tried that distance prior to water running. It's hard to say it was the water, since

"time heals all wounds" but it may have been a factor!

You have to build slowly into real sprinting. It is an extremely high force activity all over the lower body in flexion AND extension, so you need to actually run some SSC with specific sprint speeds and only speed up a little bit each cycle, and be progressive about the way you increase the speed as you enter into full-on sprinting at 100%, which should really be built up to over 4-6 months or more, depending on how long it has been since you regularly were able to sprint @ 100% speed without injuries building up.

Very good point Josh. Coincidentally, I was reading http://running.competitor.com/2012/07/t ... nners_8047 and http://running.competitor.com/2012/06/t ... 749/3which discuss improving speed for longer runs. First doing strides at the end of a run, then occasional bursts during longer runs until finally hitting stand-alone intervals. Building up gradually as you say. Whenever I've tried standalone speed work on a track I've had to limp off.

I've had better luck on a treadmill, maybe because the speed and turnover are limited to what is set, and I the fastest

I've gone up to is 10mph. The thought of tripping and being flung off backwards butt first is enough to instill abundant caution. The embarrassment as much as the physical pain!

In any event, I'd certainly be interested in working on sprinting in a safe and controlled manner. Thanks for the pointer!

I'd say that water running is great for (p)re-hab or to add occasional variety into your workouts. I don't think that it would be effective as a central component of a training routine but it might be a great thing to do once in a while.

Some variations:

take a kickboard and push the water in front of you as you go along

put floats on your feet/ankles, there are fancy ones and there are ones that look like water wings

wear a waistband float and "run" in deep water

grab a weight and run on the pool bottom

do agility stuff like ladder runs

do karate kicks or balet moves

One of my team mates last year had to stop his summer running because of a stress fracture. He replaced running with aquajogging(water running with a floating vest) and continued his weightlifting and swimming until the injury was healed(2 months). He came back that season after doing no running for 2 months, placed first in each race he competed in, and won the AAAA state cross country championships in georgia 2010. While not ideal, aquajogging is an excellent second choice for endurance training.

igm503 said:

One of my team mates last year had to stop his summer running because of a stress fracture. He replaced running with aquajogging(water running with a floating vest) and continued his weightlifting and swimming until the injury was healed(2 months). He came back that season after doing no running for 2 months, placed first in each race he competed in, and won the AAAA state cross country championships in georgia 2010. While not ideal, aquajogging is an excellent second choice for endurance training.

See, this is a prime example of training the muscles for the intended performance and not overtraining. If he got a stress fracture he was overtraining severely, which is common in cross country. You build the metabolic capacity in the muscles, you build strength, and you don't try to mimic race lengths with training runs on any kind of a regular basis.

I remember my stint in HS XC. Programming was basically run A LOT on streets. Being city kids, there wasn't that many actual trails to run on unless you ran to them or carpooled to a park or something.