Water jogging has been cited by the American College of Sports Medicine as an excellent alternative to land-based exercise, particularly when a person suffers from injuries that prevent him from comfortably running or jogging on land. Perform water jogging in deep water while wearing a buoyant belt that enables you to remain atop the water, with the water line at shoulder-height.
Warm-Ups
The beauty of water jogging is that it is designed to closely mimic running exercises on land. Much like you would warm up for a run or a series of sprints on a track, you can perform the same exercises in the water. Start by slowly jogging back and forth across the width of the pool twice. Follow up the slow jog with a single pool-width of a high-knee jog, bringing your knees up to 90 degrees in front of your body. Then do a butt-kick jog, bending your knee, moving your arms fast and hitting your butt with your heels as you bring your legs behind you. Finish your warm-up by performing a grapevine back and forth across the pool. Moving sideways, step left with your left foot to the side, cross your right foot in front of your left foot, step your left foot to the side again and cross your right foot behind your left foot. Repeat across the width of the pool and reverse the movement to return to the starting location.
The Long Haul
According to the University of Virginia School of Medicine, Dr. Robert Wilder states that aqua jogging should be as similar as possible to land-based workouts to enable the athlete to benefit from the biomechanical similarities of working out in the pool versus working out on land. For long-distance runners, this means training in the water like you would train on land. If you were planning a 5 mile run that would take about an hour, you would want to jog in the water for about an hour, moving your arms and legs at the same rate that you would be moving them on land.
Sprint Intervals
If you typically run sprints and are confined to a swimming pool, your workout needs to mimic the intervals that you would be running on land. If you know your normal 400 meter sprint takes 55 seconds, run in the water, moving your arms and legs as fast as you can for 55 seconds, followed by a period of active rest, where you essentially walk in the water for two to four minutes. Continue these intervals for the remainder of your workout. If you typically run a 400 meter, 300 meter, 200 meter, 100 meter interval workout and you know the time it takes you to perform each of these distances on land, change your workout to account for those times, sprinting as hard as you can in the water, followed by a period of rest at least as long as the time it took you to perform the run. This workout will enable you to maintain or increase your fitness level while suffering an injury.
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