So what can you do, and how do you do it properly to do aquatic therapy exercise?

The fact is that any form of exercise you do in the water can be aquatic therapy. And, many of the exercises you do outside the pool can be done in the pool, with slight alterations.

There are two different kinds of aquatic therapy. The first aquatic therapy involves any types of exercises performed in water in order to enhance and be an adjunct to your regular exercise routine as well as training. So in other words, water exercises done in addition to other exercises.

The second type of aquatic therapy is any type of exercise done in water in order to help in recovering or rehabilitating from grievous injury or arduous training. So this is the kind of aquatic therapy people who are elderly or those with injury participate in.

So, why aquatic therapy? Well, the reason aquatic therapy is so much better for rehabilitation or additional exercise is because you can exercise without having to undergo the jolting and jarring impact that occurs when exercising on the ground. Basically the water acts as a buffer to protect your joints etc. When exercising outside the pool, you put a lot of stress on the joints. It is believed that when the heel strikes the ground while jogging or running, the weight of the body is heightened by up to five times. During aquatic exercise, this simply is not the case.

It is for this reason that this type of exercise is by far the best for those with injury. It allows athletes, for instance, to maintain their fitness level without aggravating an injury they may have. Look at it this way, when there is an injury, it can be very difficult to find activities and exercises that permit you to maintain the fitness level you are at currently without risking exacerbating the injury. However, with aquatic therapy, your body gets to work out with almost zero gravity, thus there is no impact, and little chance of making injury worse.

Besides the aid in injury related things, one big advantage to aquatic therapy is water increasing resistance while exercising. And, the increased resistance is variable. This means, that the harder and faster your body works against the water, the more the resistance you will experience, hence, the harder will be your workout, and the better the workout will be. This allows you to gauge how you work out. You can work out slowly when you have injury, and hard and fast when you want something more demanding.

Aquatic exercise is an extremely beneficial and safe type of exercise. Apart from the aerobic and cardiovascular benefits of aquatic therapy, it also helps in:

• Improving the alignment of posture, balance, and coordination


• Increasing muscular strength


• Improving the body's range of motion and mobility


• Increasing and maintaining flexibility of the muscles


• Some of the other benefits of aquatic therapy are:


• The muscles experiencing a soothing massaging effect


• Being able to exercise when the weather is very hot in a lake or a pool outdoors


• Being able to exercise when the weather is very cold in a heated indoor pool