By: Josh Ellenberg
Coach, Row House Cotswold Village
Are you looking for a fun, efficient, and effective workout that gets your heart pumping?
Rowing is an exhilarating full-body workout that challenges your cardiovascular fitness, tones and strengthens multiple muscle groups, and is low-impact.
Whether you're an experienced athlete or new to the fitness scene, rowing is an excellent option to improve your overall health and fitness level.
Here are the top three reasons why you’ll love rowing workouts and how they can transform your body and mind.
Rowing is a great cardiovascular workout.
One of the main benefits of rowing is that it is an aerobic or anaerobic exercise depending on the intensity of your workout. The best part is that the intensity of the workout is controlled by YOU, the athlete.
The harder you push, the harder the workout. If you need to ease off a bit, just push a little bit lighter.
You use your legs, back, arms and core when you row, which all work together to increase your heart rate and burn calories. This makes rowing an effective way to lose weight and improve overall fitness level.
Rowing is a great way to increase your cardiovascular fitness and endurance, which is important for your overall health and well-being.
The American College of Sports Medicine recommends at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity or 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity aerobic activity per week, or a combination of both, for adults to experience substantial health benefits.
Rowing can be a great way to meet these recommendations, as it provides a challenging cardiovascular workout that can be adjusted to meet your fitness level.
Rowing targets multiple muscle groups and is mentally challenging.
Rowing involves more than 86% of the muscles in your body, including the legs, back, arms, and core.
This makes it an efficient and effective workout for people who want to tone and strengthen multiple areas of the body at once. The rowing motion pushes with the legs, swings the body with the core, and pulls with the back and arms allowing for a well-rounded workout that improves muscle coordination.
You work your quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes as you push against the foot stretcher of the rowing machine.
Your abs and obliques stabilize your entire body as you drive with the legs, leaning slightly forward, and swing open to a finish position, leaning slightly back.
Your back muscles pull on the handle at the finish and generate power through the kinetic chain of the movement, including your lats, traps, and rhomboids.
Rowing lights up your biceps and triceps as secondary muscles in the rowing movement.
In addition to the fact that rowing is a physical masterpiece of a workout, the sport will challenge you mentally since proper rowing is a skill.
You will have to coordinate multiple muscle groups to maintain proper posture and form throughout the motion. You must be mindful of the stroke rate, or how many strokes you are taking per minute. If your cadence is too quick, you will be less efficient and out of sync with the rest of your crew.
This requires a certain level of focus and discipline to learn.
Once learned, you will be more effective and efficient on the machine and generate more power, which makes rowing more fun and enjoyable.
You are constantly learning how to improve your technique as your body changes and adapts over time.
Who doesn't like adding a new skill to their repertoire?
Rowing is a low-impact exercise.
Rowing is a great way to reduce your risk of injury and improve your overall fitness level for all types of athletes.
It provides an effective workout without putting excessive stress on the joints, which makes rowing a great option for people of all ages and fitness levels.
For athletes (which is everybody who participates in exercise), rowing can provide a low-impact, challenging, and effective workout that can help you improve your overall fitness. Rowing's skill-based motion improves muscle coordination and cognitive ability.
For those recovering from an injury or impairment, rowing can be a great way to rebuild strength and regain fitness. Since rowing is done from a seated position, it reduces the stress on the lower body.
The rowing motion is a smooth and controlled motion that can be easily modified to suit your individual needs. This makes rowing a great option if you want to push yourself as an athlete or modify for any impairments you may be facing. It’s also great if you are recovering from an injury and want to regain your strength without putting unnecessary stress on the injured area.
Putting it all together.
Overall, rowing is a low-impact exercise that can suit everybody’s fitness level, whether you are at your peak performance or recovering from a setback.
It’s a full-body workout that challenges both the body and the mind.
If you’re a serious athlete looking to improve your overall fitness, recovering from an injury, or somewhere in between, rowing can be a challenging and effective workout that can help you reach your fitness goals.