Swimming & Eating

[Corlett]

Hi Guys & Girls
Just a quick question.

For years now here in Portugal people have insisted in telling me that you will probablly die if you swim within 2 hours of eating, some take it one step further and say if you shower after eating also you are putting your self in dangers way..

I am quite a physical person an train various things as well as slightly studying nutrition for athletic purposes, so beg to differ...

whilst diving here in the North Atlantic the water is cold :shocked2: so between dives we have a cup of tea / coffee , biscuits and sandwiches to `` feed ´´ our body and help maintain heat, energy levels etc etc..

I did once ask a doctor as for eating / swimming / diving and he only commented on possibly on certain conditions ( extreme cold / overexertion ) your digestion may stop, but nothing more...

All I wanted to learn by this thread is :

1. Is it a urban myth and there is no danger, or so remote not worth considering ?

2. Does anybody have any eating / swimming / diving related stories or knowledge of precautions or accidents over the years?

 

[freewillie]

There is an old wives tale that if you go swimming two hours after eating you will drown. That's actually because it is felt that if you exert yourself within the two hour window you can get cramps, and if you get cramps swimming you might drown.

It is an old wives tale for a reason, it isn't really true. Basic body physiology is that you have a set volume of blood and a limited number of things your body do at any given time. If you eat, especially a large meal, your body needs to start digesting said meal. If you then add physical exertion then your body must divert some of the blood/circulation away from the stomach to your muscles. Whether or not that causes cramps is a separate issue. It might increase the likelihood of getting cramps or a stomach ache but is not a guarantee. In fact, to keep calories and glucose levels elevated during endurance activities like marathons and triathlons high sugar snacks like cookies are often provided along with sweet sugar drinks like Gatorade.

As a former swimmer in high school we routinely ate and then went swimming for our practice/work outs. The only restrictions on swimming and eating was during meets where we avoided eating and hour or so before the race. I can't remember ever having any issues with eating and swimming.

 

[kwinter]

Comedian and impersonator Robert Klein used to do a hysterical bit about this:

One of the most interesting of the ironclad safety measures was that my father insisted I wait one hour after eating before going in swimming; something about dangerous cramping. This was probably derived from some myth about a kid who drowned in the East River in 1924 after eating an entire pot roast. Waiting a bit after a meal before swimming is not a bad idea. But with true Ben Klein hyperbole, I was warned that if I didn't wait one full hour and not a second less, I would instantly sink like a rock and die a choking, gurgling death. "You'll go right to Davy Jones's locker," my father would say ominously. I had a rough idea of what Davy Jones's locker was: a place of ruin and dead bodies and sharks eating them. The specter of death by drowning is a potent one to a ten-year-old. I recalled a scene from a movie in which a man was tortured by having his head held underwater until he was begging for mercy and nearly dead. I remembered being held underwater myself by bigger boys during horseplay, and I had never forgotten being knocked over by an ocean wave, most of which I inhaled, and the desperate fight for breath, which I thought would never come again.
I was therefore scrupulous about waiting the full amount of time, regardless of the hot sun and the sight of other kids swimming happily ten minutes after eating. Their parents were evidently irresponsible. The idea of waiting exactly one hour was etched into my brain like a mental tattoo, as if the food would know precisely what period of time had passed since I ate it. One hour - okay; fifty-nine minutes - dead. When I got a little older, my father explained that I really didn't need to wait a full hour. The actual amount of time a child would have to wait before swimming depended on what the child ate, and my father was the arbiter at the pool or beach who would decide such things. "What did you have, a tuna-salad sandwich? With a pickle?"
"Yes."
"Thirty-three minutes. Peanut butter and jelly? Twenty-seven minutes. Bologna and cheese? Forty-two minutes. Frankfurters and beans? Too heavy. You can't go in swimming this year." . . .

 

[AngloFish]

I eat like a madman before and in between dives.. Seriously I'm the guy in the corner two handing a giant sandwich down my gullet. Aside from the occasional bout of heart burn from eating a large lunch then getting horizontal I've never died from it. Eat, dive, and be merry dude

 

[TN-Steve]

I do a lot of long distance touring cycling, and learned a long time ago that you can eat and still engage in fairly vigorous activities without a problem. I normally consume 300-400 calories per hour while riding and eat a meal or sandwich every couple of hours on top of that. And I promise you, I'm not gaining any weight on these trips. My average fuel burn is between 400-500 calories per hour riding, and it's not uncommon to have 6+ hours of riding a day to get to my next campground.

According to at least 1 online calculator, a 160 pound diver will burn about 500 calories in a dive with a 1 hour bottom time. (sorry, no other parameters were provided). I'd apply the CST (Common Sense Test), probably eating a whole sausage pizza right before you dive is a bad idea, but a sandwich or something like that before going in, not a problem. The people who compete in ultra-marathon events like RAAM (pretty much non-stop bike ride across America) have raised the art of eating while riding to a highly evolved science, but a major part of it is to make sure what you swallow agrees with you. I THRIVE on chocolate milk in the middle of a ride, others, not so much.

Trust your body and your common sense.

Steve
And save me a slice of that pizza for the after-dive.

 

[Bob DBF]

I knew it was BS since I was six and started disregarding the advice every time I could. It is an evil plot to keep kids out of the water. I never pulled that crap on my kid, or anyone else's, and they are just fine.
Just get them out before hypothermia sets in, 'cause they won't get out on their own.



Bob
------------------
I may be old, but I'm not dead yet.

 

[Frosty]

unless the food happens to be bananas of course--then its all true??

 

[Nemrod]

I have competed in triathlons and long distance open water swimming races. I can assure you that I tank up before hitting the water. I will routinely swim three miles at the Y pool and I will eat a ton before. The first mile I feel bloated and fat, the second it goes away and by the end of the third mile I am hungry again. When I was younger, after a tri, I would eat three entrees at the restaurant to the amazement of all and still be hungry. And that after having eaten two or three breakfast meals before and carbo loading the night before.

Stomach cramps my arse, what a load of hogwash.

Oh, and caffein, I carried (carry) coffee on my bike, I love it, decaf my arse.

I do not allow bananas on my boat.

N

 

[covediver]

I was discussing this yesterday with fellow employees in the lunch room. When I was a kid, the wives tale said "one hour" was the proper interval, not one second more, not one second less. I swear my mom had a stop watch and when she said "ok" we would go charing into the water.

 

[fnfalman]

If eating and diving were the cause of death then I would have died about 350-times now.