How, and Why Swimming Makes You Look Younger
So, does swimming make you look younger, or are you better off taking up other forms of exercise?
Well, as you get older (we all do; it’s inevitable), your body processes start to slow down. The level of the hormones that enhance vitality and youthfulness drops drastically.
Such hormones include the Human Growth Hormone, testosterone, and others. However, as you become even more sluggish and embrace unhealthy lifestyle habits, your body “degenerates” fast.
But there is a chance that swimming is one of the things that could make you retain your youthfulness for much longer.
It is one of the best aerobic exercises for your heart and lung health. As you will find out here, it is also very good for metabolism, fat burning and skin health.
In another article, we looked at the health benefits of swimming, and there were quite a few!
Reasons Why Swimming Makes You Look Younger
If you have been a regular swimmer for a long time, it can delay aging by a decade or so. The years will pass, but you won’t look your age.
Besides, as you enjoy the swimming benefits, your health will not suffer the same health issues that people who do not swim might experience.
Here are the reasons why swimming makes you look younger:
1. Swimming makes the joints stronger
You know that as you grow older, your joints are affected. The reason for this is that the joints are the pivotal areas in our bodies, yet they do not get enough exercise.
Swimming is one of the best low-impact exercises. Thus, it’s highly recommended for seniors or people who are recovering from knee, hip, or leg surgery.
If you swim often, you are going to help strengthen your joints. Thus, even when you get to your senior years, you will not experience the mobility issues that befall many people. Improved joint health is one of the health benefits of swimming.
The reason why swimming is good for you, especially on the joints, is that as you kick, the water supports most of the weight of your body. Actually, running on the treadmill has more impact on the joints than swimming.
2. Swimming enhances your lung and heart health
These two very important organs can age fast since they tend to be overworked. With age, the heart rate slows down and the lungs are not able to pump enough oxygen into the blood.
Aerobic activity, such as swimming, enhances the efficiency of your lungs and heart. Overall, you will experience improved circulatory health.
Research shows that people who swim can have the same physiological characteristics as people who are 20 years younger! In that case, if you swim often, you will have a strong heart, lungs, and circulatory system.
3. Swimming makes your skin look younger
In this regard, some people ask: Does swimming give you wrinkles? Well, the answer is yes. It can give you wrinkles. However, it will only do that if you are negligent.
Because of the chlorine in the swimming pool, it can clean out the sebum on your skin. This will leave your skin feeling dry and scaly. However, when you are done using the swimming pool, you should take a shower with fresh water immediately.
So then, how can swimming make your skin look younger? There are many ways. First, swimming enhances circulatory health.
This means that oxygen and nutrient-rich blood get to the muscles and tissues fast. This is what the body needs to retain a youthful look.
Also, swimming can help your body flush out the toxins that age the skin cells. It will do this when you make a habit of drinking water to keep hydrated when swimming.
When you get out of the swimming pool, take a fresh, clean shower immediately. At the same time, apply the right skin care products for moisturizing and drink a lot of water to stay hydrated.
Overall, any form of exercise is very good for your skin. Swimming can especially help shave off several years.
What swimming does for the body is that it makes the skin more elastic, smoother, and flawless. Take foods rich in antioxidants so they can help clear out free radicals and dead cells.
4. Swimming enhances the metabolic rate
One of the benefits of swimming is that it increases the rate of metabolism. Now, as you grow older, your metabolic rate slows down. You start feeling more fatigued and irritable, and you start to gain weight.
When your metabolic rate is slow, the body cannot burn down your body fat. In fact, it will convert most of the food that you eat into fat.
Aerobic activity increases the metabolic rate in the body. With a high metabolic rate, your body will burn more calories, thus maintaining low-fat reserves.
When you go on a low- or no-calorie diet, the body can metabolize the fat in your body, leaving you with a lean body.
A high metabolism can also enhance skin health and texture. The high body fat percentage inhibits the operation of most of the internal organs.
To lose weight and maintain it, swim longer and harder. Aerobic exercise enhances the metabolic rate, leaving you healthier for it.
If you have been asking, why is swimming good for you? Well, you have seen that it can solely be responsible for kick-starting your metabolism.
Please, also look into other causes of weight gain. For instance, yeast infection and weight gain have a close relationship.
5. Swimming burns belly fat
In another article, we discussed how swimming in cold water helps with weight loss. Swimming in cold water can get the body to burn more fat so that it can generate more heat for your survival.
Because one of the health benefits of swimming is activating the metabolism, your body will burn more fat.
When you swim, you can lose more weight than a person who runs. The reason is very simple, too. In the water, the buoyancy of the water offers more resistance.
To swim a full lap, you have to swim harder. You have to fight the resistance of the water. In one hour of swimming, your body can burn up to 520 calories.
Of course, this depends on factors like weight and swimming speed. Thus, you could lose slightly less or more weight per hour.
The advantages of swimming for the body include losing weight. Overweight people have bad skin, they are not happy since they have esteem issues, and they experience digestion problems.
6. Swimming enhances mental health
What does swimming help you with mentally? Well, there are many things. One of them is that swimming improves your mental health.
When you exercise more often, your body releases feel-good hormones such as dopamine, serotonin, and others. It also decreases the level of stress hormones such as cortisol, making you feel happier all the time.
A happy person is more productive than a moody and irritable person. Also, when you are happier, you socialize easily with people.
Swimming is also a social sport. You interact with people around the public swimming pool. Even when swimming in the open water, you cannot swim alone.
You are going to interact with other swimmers, trainers, and friends. When people share the same hobby, they interact so easily.
Water is therapeutic. For this reason, water elements feature a lot in traditional ayurvedic medicine system from India and Traditional Chinese Medicine.
Water calms the mind and body. It also relieves stress and anxiety. Thus, if you get anxiety attacks, start swimming, and they will abate. When your body starts secreting more of the feel-good hormones, you feel younger.
When you feel stressed, you can go near a water element or, better yet, get into the swimming pool. If you remember the four main elements of life, water is one of them.
The others are fire, earth, and air. Thus, getting in the water helps to prevent mental stress.
7. Swimming tones muscles
With age, your skin becomes flaccid. Your muscles also become loose. However, swimming can solve all of these issues for you. You need to swim consistently, say, for at least three days in a week.
One of the pros of swimming is that it works out many muscle groups in your body. It tones your leg, thigh, glutes, shoulders, and core muscles. This leaves you looking as if you stepped out of a lifestyle magazine.
You can also analyze the swimming results and see where you need to tone up the most. To do this, you can choose the most appropriate swimming stroke. Different swimming techniques target different muscle groups.
There is a way in which you can swim and engage the core muscles to help tone your belly. You can also engage in different swimming styles to tone your arms and legs.
8. Swimming is a cheap way to stay young
Don’t do Botox operations, fad diets, or exercises that require you to invest in expensive equipment just so that you can stay healthy. Enjoy the health benefits of swimming.
Just imagine; all that you need is swimming attire. Most detached homes in the suburbs have swimming pools. Condos in Florida, California, and elsewhere have community swimming pools.
If you live in countries such as Australia, India, the USA, and South Africa with their extended coastlines, you can always swim in the open water.
Actually, because of tides and currents, swimming in the ocean requires you to swim harder. Open water has more resistance.
Conclusion
As you have seen here, the answer to the question: Does swimming make you look younger? Yes, it does. There are tens of benefits of freestyle swimming.
There are also tens of positive health effects of swimming on the body. The good thing is that you can teach your kids how to swim when they are young.
There is also no limit to swimming age. As long as you are healthy, you can swim even when you are 90 or older.
If you do not know how to swim and you want to enjoy all the good things about swimming, it is not too late. It is not too late to learn how to swim. You can learn how to swim on your own without paying a trainer.
Here, we have discussed just a few ways that swimming makes you look younger. There are many others.
Just start swimming, will you? You won’t regret it. The good thing is, you can even buy an inflatable swimming pool for adults, or invest in an above ground pool.