Can You Lose Weight Doing Water Aerobics?
Water aerobics is a great way to stay fit and is extremely popular among seniors because of its low-impact nature. Prenatal water aerobics is also commonly used to ease the many uncomfortable effects of pregnancy. However, this form of exercise can be beneficial for many other people as well. Does water aerobics work for weight loss? The short answer is yes, it does! This is how.
You burn fat
All types of exercise burn fat, and water aerobics is no exception. In fact, working out in water actually enables you to burn even more calories in a shorter timeframe than you would on land. Anything you do in the water is harder than when you do it on land, as anyone who’s ever tried to walk underwater knows. The resistance provided by the water means that every movement, even the simplest ones like walking, helps to burn more fat than it does on land.
You build muscle
Exercising in water is a form of resistance training, due to the weight of the water. This means that when you’re performing any water aerobics workout, you’re building muscle and becoming stronger. Performing cardio, like water aerobics is, does help with weight loss, but combining it with resistance training makes the process even faster. Doing both at the same time is therefore ideal. Muscle requires more calories to maintain than fat does, enabling you to be able to eat more without putting on the pounds. Building muscle is actually an excellent way to reduce fat even while remaining at the same weight. You’re changing the composition of your body instead of losing weight, meaning you’ll look more toned and fit because your body fat percentage is smaller, and you have more muscle.
You’re likely to stick to it
The biggest fault of any workout plan isn’t that it doesn’t work, but that you don’t stick to it. For an exercise to work, you need to do it regularly. Running on a treadmill might not be your thing and can quickly become boring. Water aerobics, on the other hand, doesn’t even feel like exercise. It’s tons of fun and won’t feel like a chore. If you enjoy it, you’re going to keep doing it, meaning you’re going to lose more weight than you would if you went for a jog once every few months.
You can actually do it
Another major reason why this might help you lose weight when it seems like nothing else can, is because a lot of other forms of exercise are inaccessible to you. This might be because of joint pain and chronic conditions, making workouts painful and good form impossible to maintain. Water aerobics isn’t like that. Because of how the water supports your weight, it won’t cause any joint pain, and can actually help relieve it. This means that you can keep going for longer, maintain better form to maximise the effects of the exercise, and you won’t feel unmotivated and inclined to quit because it’s painful. Water exercises make weight loss and getting fit accessible to all age groups and levels of physical mobility.