Does anyone else feel swimming is overlooked?

[*zap*]

If you want a good leg/hip/core workout....put a 40# pack and some scuba fins on and tread water for a while in a deep pool. If you think you get strange looks doing a treadmill with a ruck on you ain't seen nothing.....
Just leave the waist belt unbuckled.....

 

[Poser]

I can personally confirm this is not true.

Swimming is certainly a skill based sport.
It’s arguably a good way to develop baseline fitness.
It’s also often a good way to do something (some kind of activity) if an injury is preventing you from doing something else.
IMO it’s a great foundation sport for kids to learn how to use their body in a athletic way.

That being said, you’d have to make a pretty compelling argument that swimming is suitable unto itself for carrying a heavy pack. Beyond baseline fitness, Conditioning tapers into sport specific adaptations pretty quickly. Think about it: Tri athletes still have to train all 3 sports extensively. If swimming, or running, or cycling were great at preparing you for other activities, then competitive triathletes, with an extensive training background in 3 disciplines, would be able to just train one sport and rely on the carryover to get them through the other sports. You’d be hard pressed to deny that competitive triathletes don’t have great baseline conditioning, yet they still have to spend close to equal training time on all 3 sports.

 

[*zap*]

If you want to make the best improvements @ rucking I think you will be needing to do some type of varied tempo/distance non weighted cardio.....Running is good but if you have joint issues swimming can be a very good substitute if you go about it correctly. The elliptical machine is also a good running substitute (if done correctly) it is harder on the knees/ankles/hips than swimming but it certainly greatly reduces the impact force to your body compared to running. Walking is not going to cut it....

 

[Poser]

If you want to make the best improvements @ rucking I think you will be needing to do some type of varied tempo/distance non weighted cardio.....Running is good but if you have joint issues swimming can be a very good substitute if you go about it correctly. The elliptical machine is also a good running substitute (if done correctly) it is harder on the knees/ankles/hips than swimming but it certainly greatly reduces the impact force to your body compared to running. Walking is not going to cut it....

I can’t really speak to not having done anerobic intervals to find what happens in preparation for hunting season as I typically come off of a summer Mtn bike season full of anerobic bursts and then start scouting on the weekends in September to get in shape for hunting. I do think one would need to be a pretty solid technical swimmer in order to do effective anerobic intervals (as opposed to doing them on a rower or an assault bike or hill sprints or similar). That being said, with backcountry hunting being such a “moving heavy weight” affair, I think I’d look to pushing a sled for anerobic Conditioning as being slightly more effective than some of the other options, but living and recreating in the same mountains I hunt, I don’t find that I need any supplemental anerobic training. I put all of my non sport specific training time and resources into strength training and then get into Mtn bike shape by biking, hunting shape by scouting and snowboard shape by skinning up and riding down.

So, from that perspective, swimming could certainly have a value and practical place as a piece of training for backpack hunting, but it’s certainly not a magic pill and one may need a formal background in swimming in order to use it for anerobic purposes.

To answer the OP’s question, I do not think that swimming is an overlooked or underutilized aspect of training for rucking. I think that it might be a conditioning tool for certain people with the background or desire to use it, but overall not necessarily superior to other forms of sport specific conditioning. Definitely not a one stop shop for preparing to hunt and definitely not a substitute for strength training.

 

[*zap*]

I am just basing my views on this subject on research done with members of the military who ruck very heavy loads for long distances. The best results were from 2x weekly running, 2x weekly complete body strength training, 1x weekly endurance/intensity rucks and 1 day a week of metcon which could be pushing/pulling a sled or something else.. To me, if you have leg joint issues, endurance/intensity swimming is something that can replace endurance/intensity running. That program recommends working up to 70# for longer endurance rucks and 90#+ for shorter intensity rucks. Swimming can be a very good cardio exercise depending on how you structure your sessions and if you have leg joint issues it is a very good option, imo.