How Many Swimming Lessons Does It Take to Swim?
Would you like to learn how to swim? Maybe you’re a parent who wants to involve your toddler or child in the activity. If you’re an adult, you might wonder how long it will take you to learn how to build proficiency in the water.
How long it will take will depend on various factors - factors that include your individual abilities, comfort in the water, consistency when practicing, and the specific skills that you’re learning. Let’s look at some general considerations when you're learning to swim.
Adult Swim Lessons in Basics
Basic water safety includes swimming lessons that involve treading water and floating - both of which can take a couple lessons to learn. Gaining proficiency in learning the basic stroke, such as the freestyle or backstroke, may take a few weeks to several months to accomplish. Choose a venue where adult swim lessons are regularly held.
Advanced Adult Swim Classes
Mastering more advanced strokes will take additional effort and time. You may want to focus on the butterfly or breaststroke when gaining proficiency.
Practice Swim Lessons Regularly
Remember, practice makes perfect. If you want to meet your goals more quickly, you’ll need to set aside regular practice sessions. Make sure you can schedule the time. Also, remember that everybody learns at their own unique pace. Some learners may choose day swim lessons or take adult swimming lessons offered at night. It just depends on the access to the swim school and your daily routine.
Learning to Swim: Adults vs Kids
If you're an adult just starting swim lessons, you can expect to learn the basic strokes - front crawl, backstroke, and breaststroke - in around 6 to 12 weeks. You can meet this goal if you take classes once or twice per week. Kids tend to pick things up faster, often learning the basics in classes during the summer or after school in 4 to 8 weeks.
Descriptions of More Advanced Popular Swim Strokes
Below are some of the more advanced strokes you’ll learn during your time in the water.
The Backstroke and Breaststroke
The backstroke works in symmetry with the front crawl stroke. Your body position is the reverse - face looking up and arms pulling back, finishing near your thighs. The kicking motion is also reversed, up instead of down. Below are some points to remember:
● Learning backstroke coordination takes time. For those uncomfortable having their face in the water, the backstroke offers an approachable starting point to feel buoyancy, work on form, and develop kicking strength.
● After 6 weeks, an adult learning backstroke would expect to continuously swim at least 25 yards. Advancement to swimming laps (100 yards) using the backstroke can take 12 weeks for adults.
The breaststroke is considered one of the more difficult to master . Below are some details about this popular stroke:
● Due to the "frog kick," the synchronized arm stroke and kick timing, the breaststroke is a challenge to master. The breaststroke relies on bringing the arms inward, opening them wide, and pulling inward again in synchronization with the "whip kick."
● Timing requires practice to set the cadence. Rather than lift the head fully out of the water, the trick is learning how to time breaths with the stroke.
● While kids may only need 4 weeks to get the basics, adults should give themselves 6 to 8 weeks to properly coordinate breaststroke arms, legs, timing, and breathing - up to 25 continuous yards.
● Even for strong adult swimmers, going from 25 yards to swimming 100 yard-long laps of the breaststroke may take up to 12 weeks.
Realizing Your Goals
A swimmer who wishes to realize fitness benefits or to train for pool races will typically need to take 6 months to work up to swimming 30 or more continuous minutes. More advanced swimmers might aim to build up their swimming skills to a mile in open water races over a longer time.
So, learn to swim and follow the rules - then dive into the water!