As a swimmer, all of the “swimming injury prevention” exercises I did were all high reps, low weight exercises. The rationale for this was that high reps, low weight exercises would minimize activation of larger muscles, which would allow the smaller, stabilizer muscles to work optimally. At a surface level view, this makes sense. But if you dig a little bit deeper, does it still make sense?
Why it Does Not Make Sense:
When swimming through the water at high speeds, you are activating a significant number of muscles. Both large muscles that are responsible for moving the shoulder and smaller muscles that stabilize the shoulder. The role of the stabilizing muscles is to help keep the humerus centered in the socket, putting the shoulder in the optimal position for the larger muscles to do their jobs. For the shoulder, examples of the larger muscles are the deltoids, pectoralis major, and latissimus Dorsi. The smaller, stabilizing muscles include rotator cuff (the infraspinatus, supraspinatus, teres minor, and subscapularis) and muscles around the scapula such as the rhomboids and serratus anterior.
When swimming fast, there is an incredibly high muscular demand, which requires high muscle activation. Not just for the muscles who move the shoulder, but also the muscles that help stabilize the shoulder too.
In fact, we need the rotator cuff and scapular muscles to INCREASE their activation during activities that require a lot of muscular force, like swimming. Without an equal increase in rotator cuff and scapular muscle activity, the humeral head will become unstable, which can to ligamentous laxity, biceps tendonitis, shoulder instability, and other common injuries. If the rotator cuff and scapular muscles did not increase activity in proportion to the lats, pecs, and deltoids, then every time a swimmer would swim fast there shoulder become unstable!
What Should We Do for Swimming Injury Prevention?
For all exercises, not just ones targeting the muscles that help stabilize the body, giving the appropriate resistance is critical for muscle adaptation. Using weights less than 5 pounds for all prehab or injury prevention exercises will not prepare the rotator cuff and scapular muscles for the demands of swimming. This another common mistake I see with dryland programs. Without enough load, the muscles that help stabilize the shoulder will not become strong enough to handle the demands of swimming. When the muscles around the shoulder blade and rotator cuff become stronger, your shoulder will become more robust and resilient. Which can lead to a decreased risk of injury. Therefore, all the exercises we consider injury prevention exercises NEED to be challenging. A swimmer should not be able to do mindless repetitions.
How Do We Know If an Exercise is Challenging Enough?
Here are a couple of tools you can use to determine if an exercise is the right level of challenging. What works for some people may not work for others, so using a couple of these may be helpful.
RPE
One of the tools many coaches use is RPE, or rate of perceived exertion. After completing an exercise, simply asking your swimmers their RPE is a great way to gauge how challenging the set was. RPE is based on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the hardest effort possible. An RPE around 7-8 out of 10 is the sweet spot of knowing the exercise was challenging enough, but not too fatiguing.
Reps in Reserve
Another way to gauge intensity is reps in reserve. Reps in reserve is measured by how many more repetitions an athlete thinks they could have done until failure. Leaving 1-2 reps in reserve after each set will ensure that the set of exercise was challenging enough to stimulate muscle strength and/or hypertrophy.
Observation
For younger athletes, being observant and noting when their form starts to worsen or when they cannot complete the full motion of a rep is another way to gauge the intensity of the exercise. Another simple trick I like to use is to see the swimmers are actually counting the number of reps. If you prescribe 8 reps of exercise and find your swimmers still doing the exercise after 2 minutes, they clearly have not been counting the number of reps. If an exercise was challenging enough, a swimmer would definitely not want to do it for 2 minutes, and would there count the number of reps.
Main Points for Swimming Injury Prevention Exercises:
- Injury prevention or “prehab” exercises need to be done with heavier loads to prepare them for high level activities like swimming
- Without sufficient load, there will be no adaptations, thus the muscles who help stabilize the body will not become stronger
- There are many ways to gauge exercise intensity to ensure strength and hypertrophy gains
References:
Lee SB, An KN: Dynamic glenohumeral stability provided by three heads of the deltoid muscle. Clin Orthop Relat Res (400:40-74, 2002.
Wattanaprakornkul D, Halaki M, Cathers I, Ginn KA. Direction-specific recruitment of rotator cuff muscles during bench press and row. J Electromyogr Kinesiol. 2011 Dec;21(6):1041-9. doi: 10.1016/j.jelekin.2011.09.002. Epub 2011 Oct 5. PMID: 21978788.