Swimming competitions: history, types, benefits

Swimming competitions - one of the mostamazing in the world of spectacles. It is breathtaking when you watch confident, strong movements of swimmers on the relay race. Knowingly swimming is often called the most beautiful sport. How did it originate, and what is Russia's contribution to its development?

Why is it useful to swim?

Swimming is called one of the most useful speciessport. It is no accident that doctors recommend that people with various problems and illnesses should deal with it. First of all, swimming is a wonderful source of activity, despite the fact that all muscle groups work in the right mode and there is no overloading.

Thanks to this sport developsthe cardiovascular system. When a person swims, the heart pumps blood more efficiently. A useful discipline is also for the musculoskeletal system, since muscles and ligaments of the shins are trained. They are stretched and strengthened in water. Those who spend a lot of time in the same position, must necessarily go into the pool at least once a week. Extremely recommended swimming for those who suffer from scoliosis, cerebral palsy, the consequences of heart disease. Among other things, it helps prevent venous congestion. It is advised to deal with it and as a physical therapy, because water heals and cleanses the skin, and also positively affects the nervous system - removes irritability, excitability, soothes and tones. In addition, swimming helps to strengthen immunity, so it is useful for people prone to frequent colds. And this is the least traumatic sport!

Let's touch history

Swimming has been known since ancient times. Archaeologists believe that in Phenicia people were engaged in this sport. Of course, then he did not have a competitive-game character. Rather, it was necessary to swim to be able to survive in order to help yourself to get food. For the first time to engage in swimming as a method of physical training became the ancient Greeks, and since then it has enjoyed an unquenchable popularity. Now it is divided into several types.

The first schools for swimming appeared ineighteenth century. A century later, basins for practicing this discipline began to be built everywhere. The peak of its popularity was reached by the end of the nineteenth century.

The first competition

The very first match between swimmers took placein the sixteenth century, in Venice. Since then, swimming competitions have been held regularly, but only three centuries later in England, the first official organization, the Association of Sport Swimming Worshipers of England, was registered. The British gave the start, and after them similar associations began to open around the world.

In 1890, the European Swimming Championship was held in Austria-Hungary, and within four years the discipline was included in the program of the Olympic Games.

Swimming competitions are both personal -when victory or defeat is awarded to one person, and personally-team - here points are distributed among individuals, and also are given to the team in aggregate.

Types of sailing

As already mentioned above, there are severaltypes of this discipline. The oldest is considered sports - it was born approximately in the sixteenth century. This is a variety of swimming competitions at a distance of 50 to 1500 meters in the pool and up to 25 kilometers in open space. This type has such a name, because the methods used by the participants of the relay race are exclusively sporting, allowing to develop a high speed. They are written in the rules, and others are simply prohibited.

Another kind is game swimming. They are mobile games in the water, which are successfully used in the training of young athletes. This type of swimming, of course, is most suitable for children and teenagers. He develops coordination, trains muscles, aims to develop a sense of camaraderie. To him belongs, for example, water polo, which is now included in the Olympic sports.

Applied swimming is called overcoming obstacles on the water, ways to save drowning, methods of immersion to depth.

And, at last, the fourth kind of swimming - synchronousswimming, or, in other words, artistic, figurative. Here there are various choreographic movements with gymnastic elements. Perhaps, synchronized swimming can rightfully be called the most beautiful sight. It is divided into two parts: technical (the athlete is told which figures to perform) and free (no restrictions). There are both pairs and teams.

History of synchronized swimming

Synchronous swimming originated at the beginning of the pastcentury in Canada and originally had another name - a water ballet, for the similarity with this kind of art. At the Olympic Games, the synchronic swimmers first performed in 1948, but synchronized swimming became a real Olympic discipline only in twenty years. Starting from this year, it is officially called "artistic swimming". Perhaps, this corresponds to the truth: after all, solely through long, exhausting training, which requires endurance, flexibility, and great impact, athletes can achieve synchronous movements, which we, the spectators, so admire.

In synchronized swimming competitions there are twoparts, as already mentioned above. In technical duets and teams, a certain number of elements and time (20 and 50 seconds) are given, for which they must be performed by everyone, and in strict order. Figures indicate an ad hoc committee. In the free part, the coach and athletes are given scope for imagination - here you can show anything, however, time is still limited (4 minutes to duets and 5 minutes to teams). The more complex and artistic the number, the more points will be put by the judges. An important role in obtaining a score is played by an arbitrary performance.

The greatest popularity and development of synchronized swimming has reached in Canada, America, France, Spain and Russia.

Swimming in Russia

The very first All-Russian competitionsswimming took place in the 1920s in Moscow. Since 1928, it was an indispensable discipline in the Spartakiad. A new round of development of swimming, like any other sport, was received after the war.

At present, in Russia this is one of the mostfavorite and popular disciplines. Constantly there are various competitions - it is enough only to look at the calendar of swimming competitions to make sure of this. Every month almost every day is painted - tournaments, championships, regional competitions, championships, cups ... During 2017, athletes took (and will still participate) in the Grand Prix swimming in open water in Santa Fe, and in the Cup of Russia , and in competitions "Jolly Dolphin", and in the World Cup ...

In the twenties of the last century in RussiaSynchronized swimming also arose, but the first competitions began only in the 1960s. Earlier they were only urban, but in 1981 the national team of our country successfully performed in Yugoslavia at the European Championships.

Since 2000, synchronized swimming in Russia has receivedlike a new push. Our athletes have become confidently leading the Olympic Games. There was an opportunity to talk about the actual development of this discipline in our country. So, for the past seventeen years since the beginning of the century, five Olympiads have been held. Each time, the Russian team took away the gold in synchronized swimming.

"Not everything is gold that glitters," readsa famous proverb. Wisdom does not take her - she rightfully refers to swimming in general and synchronized swimming in particular. A lot of physical and mental suffering is behind that beautiful picture that we see from the stands and the screen. However, the viewer, as a rule, does not know about this. So, only for one this swimmers are worthy of admiration and respect!