{"id":3718,"date":"2025-01-06T08:46:18","date_gmt":"2025-01-06T08:46:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movewithnicole.com.au\/blog\/how-many-laps-equal-a-mile-in-swimming.html"},"modified":"2025-01-06T08:46:18","modified_gmt":"2025-01-06T08:46:18","slug":"how-many-laps-equal-a-mile-in-swimming","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/health\/how-many-laps-equal-a-mile-in-swimming.html","title":{"rendered":"How Many Laps Equal a Mile in Swimming?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A mile is a mile is a mile, right? Well, no \u2014 not if you\u2019re in a pool.<\/p>\n<p>A mile in swimming is not always the same distance as a mile walking, running, or biking (or any other way of covering distance on the ground). While a mile is equivalent to 1,609 meters or 1,760 yards, a \u201cmile\u201d\u00a0swim race is typically 1,500 meters or 1,650 yards.<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s why: Only three countries (the U.S., Myanmar, and Liberia) still use imperial units of measurement, including the mile. Everywhere else, metric is the standard. That includes the Olympics, which has included a 1,500-meter swim race \u2014 a distance known as the \u201cmetric mile\u201d \u2014 since 1908.<\/p>\n<p>For swimmers training or competing in a pool that\u2019s measured in yards rather than meters, a 1,650-yard distance \u2014 just under 1,509 meters \u2014 offers the closest approximation of that 1,500-meter distance.<\/p>\n<p>And when calculating how many laps are in a mile in swimming, it\u2019s important to know exactly what a lap is. One length of a pool \u2014 that is, swimming from one wall to the other \u2014 is considered one lap.<\/p>\n<p>(You may have heard that one lap equals two lengths \u2014 up and back \u2014 but \u201claps\u201d and \u201clengths\u201d are\u00a0actually the same thing.)<\/p>\n<p>So if you\u2019re\u00a0training for a triathlon\u00a0or just\u00a0swimming for the cardio benefits, how far are you supposed to swim if you want to go one mile?<\/p>\n<h2>How Many Laps Are in a \u201cMile\u201d Swim?<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<p>It depends on where you\u2019re swimming. In open water, a mile is a mile. But in a pool, it gets a little tricky, because\u00a0pools vary in size:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>To swim a mile in a 50-meter, Olympic-sized pool, you\u2019d have to swim 30 laps.<\/li>\n<li>Swimming a mile in a 25-meter \u201cshort-course pool\u201d would require 60 laps.<\/li>\n<li>Finally, you\u2019d have to swim 66 laps in a 25-yard pool (the size of most college and high school pools in the U.S.) to swim a mile.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Here\u2019s a table comparing what you\u2019d need to swim in each type of pool in order to complete a \u201cmile\u201d swim race.<\/p>\n<table>\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td><strong>Pool Size<\/strong><\/td>\n<td><strong>Laps Per Mile<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>50-meter pool<\/td>\n<td>1,500 meters = 30 laps<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>25-meter pool<\/td>\n<td>1,500 meters = 60 laps<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>25-yard pool<\/td>\n<td>1,650 yards = 66 laps<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>Now, if you want to swim a full mile in a pool \u2014 aka 1,609 meters or 1,760 yards \u2014 then add another 2 lengths in a 50-meter pool, 4 more lengths in a 25-meter pool, or 4\u00bd additional lengths in a 25-yard pool.<\/p>\n<p>(It won\u2019t be exactly\u00a0a mile, but you\u2019ll be within a few feet.)<\/p>\n<p>No matter the distance you choose to swim, you\u2019ll get a great workout and\u00a0burn calories.<\/p>\n<p>At a moderate effort, a 150-pound person burns almost 200 calories while swimming for 30 minutes.<\/p>\n<p>If they swim at a vigorous pace, that same person will burn about 335 calories in 30 minutes.<\/p>\n<p>So dive in and work on your\u00a0freestyle stroke, or try one of these\u00a0swimming workouts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A mile is a mile is a mile, right? Well, no \u2014 not if you\u2019re in a pool. A mile in swimming is not always the same distance as a mile walking, running, or biking (or any other way of covering distance on the ground). While a mile is equivalent to 1,609 meters or 1,760 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3719,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[91],"class_list":["post-3718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","tag-fitness"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3718\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ozhelp.org.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}