anitan1 wrote:
Devlin wrote:
Tri-Banter wrote:
I'm trying to imagine what 80 spm looks like. I generally take about 14-16 strokes per 25 short course yards on about 1:25 per minute. That's 60 strokes per 100 or about 45 strokes per minute. I'm not sure I can efficiently double my rate per minute without heinously messing up my stroke.
And how many yards are you taking on a flip turn, that you would have to take strokes for in open water?
Personally, I would take the advice of Gerry Rodrigues (Who advocates a higher turnover for OWS) over anything Laughlin says. Total Immersion allows you to complete the swim, not compete the swim.
John
So, okay, this is a serious thread BUMP but, I'm also trying to figure this out. I've worked for years at my swim technique and I've been happy with my gradual improvements. Background on me:
I'm not fast by any stretch of the imagination. In August I swam 1:13 and change at Ironman Boulder. Last weekend I swam 1:11 and change in Arizona. Recently, I've started noticing in the pool how my body slows down between strokes (before the next catch I can see my body slow down with respect to how quickly the bottom of the pool passes by). I attribute this to an overly long glide in the water OR a too slow cadence (I'm assuming these are the same thing?). I don't think this has just recently crept into my swim, RATHER, I think that I'm now able to critique my swim in ways that I've not previously been able to. Per Devlin's criteria above, I can probably swim my 100 yard efforts at 1:35 repeatedly with 16 to 18 strokes per 25 yard length (no flip turns, just touch and kick off).
Last week, I spoke with a swim coach in Tempe about this and he agreed that this was most probably a cadence issue. Further, he recommended an under-cap metronome that I could gradually adjust to increase cadence. I'd like to know where you Fishies out there stand on this issue. Is this )a metronome) a reasonable way to increase turnover? More importantly, is turnover my problem?
You could go the tech route and buy the Finis metronome but that is a real late-comer to the whole tempo side of swimming, and really this is just another gadget to fool with, learn to use, try to syn your stroke with the beeps, etc. Or you could just use the "old-school solution", which has been used for, oh I don't know exactly, but around the last 100 yrs or so before that gadget came along. During the entire 20th century, swimmers decided on their best turnover rate simply by swimming all-out sprints of 25 to 50 yds/m, and the 20th century guys and girls went pretty damn fast. If you do these sprints and truly try to turn over your arms as fast as you can, and do these sprints as your only workout of say 30-45 min, after about 5 or 6 sessions your body will have forgotten all about the "stroke gap" you currently have. After say 6 x 40 min sprint sessions, you should be good to go, and then gradually add in 100s, 150s, 200s, etc, while keeping your stroke rate as high as you can for the given distance.
"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."