It takes awhile to fix a stroke. I don't believe all the folks who post 'I took one-two lessons and gained 5sec/100 instantly.' sorry, but that means you simply weren't paying enough attention to experimenting with technique on your own if it's so easy that you can instantly get a 5sec/100 speed boost in one or two measly hours and have it stick.

(If I'm not mistaken, you may have said a similar thing after your early swim lessons if I recall correctly recently.)

It will definitely help to video your stroke. That way you will really see and know if your effort is helping, and where the technical errors are.

As said, I'm def not a fish, and nothing in swimming came easy for me. I know that for me at least, after my early noob days where there were some easy ugly technique errors, I NEVER got faster without training harder. Never. Doesn't mean I didn't ignore technique, but that without the practice of applying that new technique at speed and at fatigue, it didn't become a reality for me. As some fish have said on this forum, you can't really separate technique and power in swimming. It takes power to get a good pull with early vertical forearm, and the faster you go the more important streamlining becomes, and you get a whole new set of technique problems to solve.

But it takes awhile. Weeks for the easy technique fixes, months for the other stuff, and similarly for the power.

You also know full well why it's low yield to power through the water with suboptimal technique even if your stroke 'sucks'. Water resistance is such a big penalty that you'll plateau out quickly even after early gains of just plowing through the water withotu regard to technique refinement.

it s very normal to feel the way you do. Swimming take years and years of hard work. it dosnt happen after a month or two of focus and lessons.

also, fitness and technic go in hands... you need to get fitter to be able to execute and hold the good technic. That s why it s good to stick with ONE program from someone you trust and the improvement will come if you put the time in.

Also , i often recommend to only work on 1 apsect of your swimming during a practice...dont try to correct it all at the same time. it get overwhelming and does not happen.

In later 90s when i was a relatively slow triathlete swimmer (1+ for ironman), Chris Mccormack that was living with me told me something very simple. If you can swim 40km/week for 6 months, you will be set for the rest of your life in swimming.

this was true. The part he didnt mention is, you simply cant jump to 40km/week..... you have to train so hard to get to the point of been able to do so....so it took a good 6-7 years of good work to get to the poiint of been able to handle 40km/week...and after that 6months of hell where i swam 9 times a week....i pretty much never missed a front pack in any triathlon around the world...

it takes times...patience...stick with it....

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Jonathan Caron / Professional Coach / ironman champions / age group world champions
Jonnyo Coaching
Instargram

I feel your pain...I race 40mins for HIM and 1:25-1:28 for IM and really I am the same pace for shorter races. My legs sink, I crossover, my pull sucks...I have been reading all your swimming posts and frankly I am afraid to really dedicate myself to it because I am afraid I will not improve. I am gonna be 50 in June, and I am still getting faster on the bike, getting smarter on how to race the run well but my swim is the same.

So all I have to offer you is to stay after it and when you get about 6 weeks out from your A race - just go for fitness.

In short, you can and will never come close to reaching your full potential if you adopt the HTFU swim harder mentality only. Technique cannot be ignored. To say it's impossible is a tough mental hurdle to overcome if that's how you really feel.

That said, if swimming hard/ignoring tech makes you happy and you can live with that then rock on. Nothing wrong with that either. Quite honestly with the volume and tone of your swim threads I think you might want to consider that b/c there is nothing I hate more than seeing someone get burned out and quitting. Make it fun.

You cannot expect these swim faults and fixes to be nailed quickly. I might be a bad example and maybe my uptake was slow, but in 2010 I spent ~ 7 months spending 3/4 of my time doing all manner of kick and balance drilling. 5-6 days a week, but well under 10k a week. Only then did I put all the pieces together. THAT is when the real learning began....after that. Reason being is everything I thought I *knew* b/f then felt so radically different in that balanced position it was like starting over. BUT it all made sense and clicked. Having a high elbow catch and pull was easy, yet I had spent almost no time practicing a high elbow during my 7 months, it was kick awareness and body balance almost exclusively. I kept wondering when we were going to work on the almighty catch and he just kept saying 'hold on man cart b/f the horse'. Drove me nuts for awhile, but in the end I just trusted his pedigree and went with it.

Good luck man hope you stick with it. Whatever you do have fun.

I think I've said this before, but maybe not. The wrong thing to do is to noodle along slowly trying to fix your stroke, as you are finding out. Pace matters, and power matters. IMO the point of doing the drills and the slow technique work is to learn the movement pattern, and what it "should" feel like. Then, you need to apply it to your stroke at normal speeds. That means hammering even when your stroke is breaking down, as long as you TRY to maintain form in your stroke.

There are some things you might never be able to do, and that is where different swim styles come in. I don't have the shoulder flexibility to swim like Sun Yang, as much as I would like to. I just try to get as streamlined as possible, and generate as much power as possible from the front end (arms) and back end (feet) as I can for the energy I want to expend.

So basically, the lesson is to know what you are doing and what technique changes you need to make, and fix those at the same time as you are swimming as much as possible, as hard as possible. for example, if you know you are lifting your head to breathe, swim as hard as you can while still keeping your ear pressed against your shoulder on the breath. If you are doing a scissor kick, swim as hard as you can while doing the things that prevent the scissor (usually related to breathing late and taking too long to breathe), etc.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

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2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

ok, i will keep it simple.

-you average 7500m/week. That is extreme minimum to learn to swim. you should not expect big improvement out of this.

-if you can swim 5 times a week..... 10 000m - 20 000m/week. you will see some improvement. All you have to commit is to show up, do the workouts and work hard... and you will improve. But give it a honest 10-20 weeks of consistancy. Dont overthink it. YOUR JOB IS TO SHOW UP.

just with this...you will see gain in both technic and fitness.

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Jonathan Caron / Professional Coach / ironman champions / age group world champions
Jonnyo Coaching
Instargram

Honestly, that is pretty much the minimum. I'd bump it up, so you are still doing the hard stuff you are currently doing, but add yards aimed at technique. Most college programs are doing that yardage, or a little more, every day. (We typically did 4500 in the AM, and about 6000in the PM, so 10,500 or so a day on the days we did doubles, average 50-60,000 a week.

One of the other posters who is an ex college swimmer told me to get into the fastest lane I can in masters...

thats a strategy that might work, and might not. I think it will work better for a collegiate swimmer who typically already has a pretty good starting foundation. If you really don't have the basics down, it can actually make bad technique worse. Just trying to keep up also introduces bad habits if you aren't aware of them. In my case, I would crossover pretty bad when I was fighting to keep up, until my coach pointed out that's what I was doing.

ETA - thinking a bit more about this, what I mean is there is nothing wrong with getting in the fastest lane you can and hammering to keep up and/or stay ahead. But don't expect that just doing this will magically improve your technique. Some things might (and probably will) get a bit better, and other things might get worse.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

It's situations like yours that make me wonder why triathlon is so popular, but duathlons are not. In my area there are at least 20 triathlons for every duathlon.

In any case, I often think that non-swimmers just don't feel the water and work with it. They try to defeat the water, and the water wins.

As to your situation, I think you have two choices:
1. Give up on swimming
2. Dedicate yourself to swimming.

If you decide to dedicate yourself, I have a couple of comments.

1. First, similar to something somebody else said above, in my opinion every decent "fish" out there has gone through at least a few periods of several months of 25,000 yards per week. My metric is a bit lower than the 40,000 per week mentioned above, but it is similar in concept, so I thought I would say so to back up the person above.
2. Second, don't underestimate the benefit of Total Immersion, or similar systems, for people in your position. They are often blasted for swimming slowly. The key is that a program like that could get you to a reasonable enough form that you could then build some volume and speed on top of it.

In 2012 I decided that I would go from 3 swims a week to 2, since I figured I wasn't improving anymore and I was better off spending more time on the bike and run. I was also having anxiety issues in the water, so I figured my swim time would be based more on my ability to get calm and in my zone rather than how fit I was in the water. I pb with a 30:37 swim at Racine...21st overall :)

TI does a lot of good stuff, especially for getting the basics on body position right. The main issue with them is that they only really look at streamlining, but overemphasise drill work, and haven't focused on the propulsion side. Maybe they'll change their system eventually, but I doubt it, because they are trying to sell a "system", which means coming up with all kinds of weird drills, whereas a regular coach isn't pushing a particular brand or system, just results. A lot of the time, a good coach isn't actually giving you any feedback, but they are watching.

These are the only drills I ever do. All are aimed at simply isolating one part of the stroke to focus on it. If I spent more time in the water, I might add a couple of others.

catch-up free
one arm fly (and variations thereof, like 2 left, 2 right, 2 full).
underwater breast
full stroke breast, kicking with a pull buoy
one arm back.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

Technique is absolutely essential you for you to get faster ('technique' = fixing your stroke defects). So is fitness. But fitness alone will just get you fitter, and you'll just be able to swim a lot longer at a painfully slow speed. But technique plus fitness equals speed (and lots more fun).

Then, if you're injured with regard to other sports, I think 5-6 days a week in the pool is a good idea. Consistently logging 10,000+ yards a week will not be hard then. However, if you're posting here and frustrated with your lack of technique improvements (assuming you have been at this for a long time), then my first suggestion would be to get a new coach. How to find a great coach? I wrote about this a while ago here. Maybe it will help you.

Yes, you can learn to swim as an adult. And, if you're very persistent, motivated, and highly adaptable, you can even learn to swim quite fast as an adult. Don't give up.

Greg @ dsw

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The reasons why Tris are so popular is for non-swimmers there is still a wow factor of holy shit, I just swam 2.4 miles with 2500 other people. Even tho I am not a fast swimmer this is still amazing to me because before I did it I thought I could NEVER do it.

I don't want this to devolve into a discussion on TI, as that subject already has many threads. But you are kind of making my point. TI (or similar systems), can be used to get the basics decent enough, and stabilized, so that the OP can move on to more volume and speed, and further technique improvements.

I agree with you. I just think that if someone goes into it, they should just be aware of what they do well, and where the limitations are and when it's time to move on. That's all.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

Well, seeing as you are such a young lad (I'm over 60), you've hot lots of time.

Anyway, I suck at swimming as well. Late adult onset swimmer (only started free 3 years ago). So, there is lots that I do wrong. I'm in a swim club, twice a week, getting coached. My times don't really seem to be improving but I feel that my technique is, a bit. I still have sinking legs, my head rotates far too much when I breath, I kick doesn't move me forward, I drop my arms (especially my right) too far during the pull. And I could go on.

I find it real hard to work on all of these things at the same time. And if I focus on one, the others deteriorate even more. I'm sure my coach is getting frustrated as well.

But, every once in awhile, for a length or two, it seems to come together and I "feel" like things are clicking. I have no idea what I look like at that point, maybe I'm deluding myself. But, it is like gold, every once in awhile you put together a few great shots and that keeps you coming back. Same thing for swimming for me.

Plus, I have some Tris this summer and need to get through the swim part so I'll keep going and hope that things get better.

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BC Don
Pain is temporary, not giving it your all lasts all Winter.

You are on the right track. The general method applied for new competitive swimmers is to have them swim hard with corrections being passed on along the way. For example, if you join the high school swim team as a newbie you are most definitely not going to be spending the first month or two doing drills. Your ass will get kicked on day one and it will continue day after day, month after month until you either quit or figure it out. The coach (if he or she is good) will be telling you how to correct your stroke while he or she kicks your ass but you do not get a pass on the work until you have a perfect stroke.

It doesn't help that duathlons are offered alongside triathlons and advertised as "a duathlon option for the swimming-challenged." When I see that, I wonder what the heck their marketers are thinking.

Personally, I like doing duathlons, but the challenge of a triathlon is a good thing. If I stuck to doing things where I really excelled, I probably wouldn't be doing sports at all.

OTOH, I really do share the OP's frustration over working years and years on swimming technique without tangible progress. I'm just not ready to throw in the towel yet.

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Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
Which is probably why I was registering 59.67mi as I rolled into T2.

Just swim you rear off. Ease off if your shoulder acts up, but odds are it'll be fine.

As said above, 7500 can really be considered low-level, almost minimal training for someone who's not a rank beginner who's trying to improve. You really aren't training much at all - at that volume, even great coaching will have very limited benefits.

Wow! There's a solution. Impossible for most of us though. But interesting none the less. I like it, but let's see, 40km/week would probably be a little over 13 hours of steady swimming. So an average of 2 hours a day. That might be viable if you are a pro and don't have a regular job ... but when combined with cycling and running ... wow. Impressive though.

25's and 50s are good for some things, working on very specific and/or very technical changes. But for gross motor pattern changes slow down a little and increase the distances.

You can also use fins, buoy, snorkel and other toys effectively to improve your stroke. Most triathletes use these as a crutch. There is a triathlete at my masters group who uses a buoy and kicks during every set. Buoy = crutch in this case. (wait until I make a swim band for his feet and call him out for kicking during pull sets! -That's lesson #1 on how to make friends at practice)

Bottom line technique work and volume go hand in hand. Ignoring one while focusing on the other is not going to work.

Maybe you do a set of 10x200 :20 odd lengths you focus on only 1 thing for the entire set even lengths you swim.

7500 is often 1 practice for HS/college kids. They get as much reinforcement in 1 practice as you do in a week. You need more frequency (more swims per week not necessarily longer swims every time you get in) which will yield more volume which will give you more overall swim fitness allowing you to hold your technique together longer during your sets.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

Plenty of good info here, but thought I'd give you my n=1 perhaps to encourage you. I started swimming at age 30 right after watching the Beijing Olympics. When I started, I couldn't do more than 25 yards without stopping. I took a basic class, 30 min x 8 with a small group. Instructor gave some minimal guidance. I was frustrated, after 2 months I could still only go about 100 yards. But I'm stubborn, and I stuck with it. I would swim at the start as long as possible around 3-4 times/week. After another month or so I could do 200. Then 300, 400, 500, 1500 after another month.

Then I took another course, 30 min x 8 and started learning strokes and flip turns. I got reasonably comfortable with kick sets, but I couldn't really do fly. After a few more months swimming solo, went back for another course, and learned how to do swim workouts. Got comfortable and was the faster swimmer there. That was 1 year after starting. After 1 season of tri and 1 year of swimming, I decided to do Masters. At the beginning I couldn't finish the workouts, and was doing around 1:30/100 pace on 1:40 for freestyle. But I started swimming 3 times a week at 4000/session, and eventually could make 10 x 100 @ 1:30. Then I like you got an injury and could only swim. So I started doing 5 masters/week in the morning plus 45 minutes in the evening focused on backstroke (my worst) and kick sets. That ~2 month period got me to consistently holding a 1:20/100 scy interval, sub minute 100 scy, 1:15 100 br, 12:19 1000 fr. I don't know my yardage at the time, but maybe 30k for 2 months.

So that was about 3 years to go from nothing to pretty fast (by adult standards). In summary, after the first 1.5 years or so I've had almost no technique/drill work. Just lots of HTFU and stubborness to try to be a swimmer, trying to hold feet, trying to lead the lane, etc. Incidentally, I can quit cycling all winter and pick that back up pretty quickly just by focusing on swim/run. I can swim about the same pace on 8-10k/week. YMMV. Good luck.

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Oh yeah!

If giving up is not an option, then do one simple thing.
1. Increase your yardage by 500 yards per week. In 35 weeks (more or less at the end of 2014), you will be at 25,000 yards per week. Continue with that for a while, and you will improve for sure.