Swimming Portal

Introduction to swimming

Swimming is an activity that burns lots of calories, is easy on the joints, supports your weight, builds muscular strength and endurance, improves cardiovascular fitness, cools you off and refreshes you in summer, and one that you can do safely into old age. In this article, I'll review the history of swimming, the benefits, the strokes, how to get started, what to wear, equipment you need, where to do it, and more.

What is the history of swimming?

Human beings have been swimming for millennia. According to Wikipedia, Stone Age cave drawings depict individuals swimming and there are written references in the Bible and the Greek poems "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey" dating back 1,500 to 2,000 years. There are even Egyptian clay seals from 4000 BC showing four swimmers doing a version of the crawl, and the most famous swimming drawings were apparently found in the Kebir desert and were estimated to also be from around 4000 BC.

According to the Encyclopedia of Traditional British Rural Sports, literature specifically related to swimming grew in the middle ages. It is believed that the first book devoted to swimming was Colymbetes by Nicolas Wynman written in 1538, and a more widely recognized text, De Arte Nantandi, was published in Latin by Everard Digby in 1587. The encyclopedia also reports that swimming was required of knights and that Romans built bathhouses and pools wherever they conquered to serve as social clubs and places to exercise.

Organized swimming began in the 1800s and 1900s with the creation of swimming associations (for example, the Amateur Swimming Association in 1886) and clubs that competed against each other. There are reports from that era of swimming clubs in England, France, Germany, and the United States. High-profile events also contributed to swimming's visibility. For instance, Matthew Webb swam the English Channel in 1875.

Competitive swimming continued to grow in popularity during the 1800s and was included in the first modern Olympic Games in Athens in 1896. In 1904, the Olympics in St. Louis included the 50-, 100-, 220-, 440-, 880-yard and one-mile freestyle, the 100-yard backstroke and 440-yard breaststroke, and a 4x50-yard freestyle relay.

By the 20th century, swimming had become mainstream. Indoor pools were beginning to appear, most towns with populations over 20,000 had public outdoor pools, and swimming clubs became increasingly popular for recreation. Women participated for the first time in swimming in the Olympic Games in Stockholm in 1912, and Johnny Weissmuller (considered by many authorities to be the greatest swimmer of all time and who later went on to Tarzan fame in movies) became the first person to swim 100 meters in less than one minute.

Today swimming is the second most popular exercise activity in the United States, with approximately 360 million annual visits to recreational water venues. Swim clubs, recreation centers, Y's, and many other facilities feature swimming pools. Many high schools and colleges have competitive swim teams, and of course, swimming is one of the most popular Olympic sports. Millions of Americans are swimming each year. Are you one of them? If not, the following information may help get you started.

Go Ahead And Install A Swimming Pool

Choosing, financing, purchasing and maintaining a swimming pool can turn out to be a Herculean task if you do not know which dealer to work with. In the market you will find lots of swimming pool dealers operating and the difficult part is when you find almost all of them claiming to be genuine dealers and offering you the best prices for installing the swimming pool at your place. Installing a swimming pool is not something that can be done at a go, one need to undertake careful thinking and planning for the whole thing. First you have to be convinced that you must install a swimming pool will be immensely beneficial to you in the long run, if you have the money to buy the pool and most important do you know about a good dealer who will help you in this? You have to think about many things.

Blue world pools is one of the most reputed swimming pool dealers operating in America and if you are working with them, be assured that you will get quality swimming pools installed. Often it has been seen that pool dealers quote one amount when they are marketing for the pool and once someone decides to buy it they have to deal with many other hidden costs. This is really annoying and many people at the end decide not to buy the swimming pool, just because the hidden cost keeps on getting higher and higher. In today's context installing a swimming pool is no longer a luxury that one can indulge in; rather it has become more of necessity. So probably you are serious about installing a swimming pool, but have not yet come across a dealer that offers you the best. Blue World Pools is the answer to this.

Money can be one constrain that can sometimes push back a person from buying a swimming pool and installing at their home. Now if you have finally decided to install a swimming pool at your place, there is no point in delaying this. Yes, money can be a hindrance, but this can be taken care of easily. There are several swimming pool dealers and Blue World Pools is one of them, that offer finance facility to customers who are short on money to install the swimming pool, and Blue World Pool is one such swimming pool dealer. The whole process of getting the loan sanctioned is pretty easy and all that customers have to do is submit some documents as proof of certain things.

Some of the documents that clients will have to submit to a Blue World Pools dealer are proof of ownership of the house where the swimming pool will be installed and proof of income of the person who is seeking the loan. Once these documents are submitted the processing for the loan amount begins and one can get the required money within no time. This loan falls under the category of home improvement loans, and one can repay this easily as the repayment options are also simple. So if money was the only issue that was holding you back from installing the aboveground swimming pool at your house, then you can go right ahead and get it installed.

About The Author

Eric Wills advises people on installing and setting up swimming pools.He has been working in this field for many years. For any information on Blue World Pools,blue world pool dealer, blue world hot tubs and swimming pools financing visit: http://www.abovegroundpooldealer.com