Installing an inground lap pool at home can be a great way to invest in the future of both your health and your finances. You'll be able to work out at home instead of in the greasy air and teeny-bopper soundtrack noise of the health club, and you'll probably improve the long-term resaleability of your home - there are few things more attractive to prospective buyers than a pool suitable for both exercise and play.

When it comes to picking a lap pool design, the first question to arise will be whether you even have enough space in your back yard to accomodate the necessary proportions of an inground lap pool. The shortest you can have a lap pool be without making it ineffective for exercise is about forty feet, with a width of at least eight feet and about three and a half feet for its depth. For most swimmers this may actually be prohibitively shallow - hardly the depth for diving or backflip splashing contests. The good news is that, by contrast with the typical recreational pool, the water requirements of such a pool are pretty minor.

One possibility of which you may not even yet be aware (if you're not a big infomercial watcher) is that of the endless pool, created by the eponymous Endless Pools Inc., the company that's been installing them for over a decade. People have called endless pools 'the treadmill for swimmers' and that's a fairly accurate description, although the endless pool can simulate swift swimming far better than a treadmill can the action of hard running. In fact, a well-installed Endless Pool can help you improve your endurance power in swimming to levels you never dreamed of. For those who already have a pool, the company's 'Fastlane' unit can bring all the benefits of an endless pool to just about any pool. So long as your hot tub is long enough for you to stretch arms and legs out in, you can have the best of both worlds.

Furthermore, endless swimming pool units are hydraulically powered, keeping electrical consumption to an absolute minimum - meaning less impact on your wallet and the environment. While, obviously, nothing really beats the freedom and versatility of a full-length lap pool design, this is a great alternative, with a novelty to it that will intrigue guests and delight your family.