I don't see.lots to bash. From the top it looks good, arms fully extended in front of your shoulder lips food...no crossover! If you choose to kick for.power instead of balance you might kick more from the hips and less from the knees.

The real magic is underwater and we can't see that well. That said it appears to me that your first move back is to pull your elbow back. I see that a lot and it's a major power drain. Your first move should be to get that elbow above your hand...hand below elbow. The quicker you get your hand and arm perpendicular to the bottom of the pool the sooner in the pull you will realize forward motion.

I can't see the back half of the stroke.

Hope that helpful in a friendly way.

Might be swimming a little flat. Certainly losing a lot on the catch.

Oh, and if that is a sustainable pace, that was a 44 second 50. (1:28/100). Not terrible at all.

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What do you mean by swimming flat?

I had full recovery before and after the 50. Couldn't hold this pace for a 10x100 set but just for a few 50s.

Thank you for the input so far. Will try to focus on getting the elbow above my hand.

Side to side roll. A little more could help get a bit more reach out of the stroke

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You are dropping your elbow on the left arm entry. Probably some catch/pull issues under the water, but hard to see from the video. Look for some info on "high elbow catch" or "early vertical forearm".

Body position looks good.

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your swimming above water is all pretty but not very good to educate yourself and learn.


you have no catch, so very limited in propulsion. When doing video review, you will find underwater shot will be very powerfull in teaching you and learning what s happening under water.... watching video from others does help but it still not as good of a teaching tool as a video of yourself...


try to get some video underwater from side view following you like in this youtube i made.... it will help you greatly

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cg-GB2_lPyI


and to help you with your catch....


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1KReTEXiBM

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Thank you guys. I might organize a camera to get an underwater video. But for now I was just happy to get at least something to see myself swimming for the first time.

I would just resurrect this thread as soon as I get some footage. In the mean time I have some work to do with my elbows.

As others have mentioned, the surface view is difficult for confirming a few things, but I think as you extend forward you are planing out very shallow--I imagine at peak extension (prior to initiating the underwater stroke) your wrists are only a few inches below the surface. Experiment with various depths out front. I suspect you'll like something like 12" or so below the surface, not just a few. Experiment with that and I'll think you'll almost instantly discover an orientation that feels more comfortable and more effective.

Here's why:

1. Being shallow out front makes it much more likely your elbows will drop deeper than your wrist, setting up a very ineffective (or non-existent) catch.
2. The shallower you drive out front, the more your back end is likely to drop. One can overcome sinking legs by kicking more, but that's a high energy cost solution when you could just extend to a deeper point out front.
3. Shallow end points also reduce rotation. Others have noted that you seem under rotated, and I think this is why. Driving a little deeper makes rotation a natural--rather than forced--component of the stroke.
4. Extending shallow transfers much of the workload to the smaller muscles that cap your shoulders. By driving a little deeper I think you'll experience noticeably less strain. While there is a popular notion that you want to "feel the work," in this case I think you want to transfer the workload to more and larger muscles--like recruiting friends to help you move a sofa.
5. You don't want your wrist shallower than the shoulder it is extended forward of. That's like doing lateral raises in the gym and lifting the dumbbells higher than your shoulder. You should be equal to or slightly below the shoulder.

If I can manage to actually upload a pic, I'll include one that shows one of my assistant coaches (a 2004-08 Olympian) taking a breath. Notice that his right arm is extended forward and probably a good 10 inches below the surface. On non-breathing strokes he actually drives to a slightly deeper location.

I think the crew has said it all but - how much kick-only work do you do?

The power of the catch is very much linked the platform afforded by the legs.
The leg-action also helps/drives the roll that Jason is talking about.

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Pretty much no kick sets. I'm one of these swimmers who go almost "backwards" when just kicking.

@Strokedoctor: that's a good explanation. I'll try different depths. But won't be able to hit the pool in a week. Will keep you updated.

I'm certainly not qualified to respond - so of course, I'll respond.

Looks pretty good, legs not sinking. Left arm should 'stab' the water more (downward) on entry.
Looks like your left hand enters flat and then pushes upwards til you start your catch.
And looks like you could have a much stronger catch/pull -- engaging the lats more.
As somebody mentioned, maybe more body roll would result in stronger pull-through.
And maybe.. kick is large. A real coach might tell you to tighten it up a bit?

Took me a while, but finally I was able to borrow a cam to get me filmed underwater. I guess there are no real improvements since I posted my last video. Anyway, for some reasons I feel stronger in the water than last year when I swam more.
When I try to do this EVF thing (you probably won't see it in the video) it feels hard on my shoulders and I fatigue really fast. Do I just need to HTFU?

Bit of a bump but I'd be interested to know what better swimmers than me think of when you swim directly towards the camera at about 56s. It looks to me like the hand starts catching wide outside a vertical line from the elbow. Then it moves to a better position when it's down by the hip but it looks, to me, like it's slipped water to get to that position. Viewed from above I think you want the hand to enter directly in front of it's shoulder and then move back beneath a pretty straight line towards the hip.

I never had a chance to see the original so can't comment on any improvements between then and now. Overall not a bad stroke but what I am seeing is as follows:

-Imbalance in your stroke which is causing very poor catch. You're carrying a lot of air around your left hand especially. Work on a smoother entry and early catch. The left hand is also acting as a brake as once you enter you can see your finger tips go back to the surface of the water.

-Breathing, which will add to the imbalance, is only happening on one side here. For people that picked up swimming later in life it is important to work on bilateral breathing to enforce an even stroke. For this area don't look at olympic/varisty level swimmers and think that because they breath to one side it is okay for you too. They spent 100x longer developing their stroke mechanics when they were younger.

-The finger tips returning to the surface after your entry, where your catch should start, is partly caused by you swimming flat as someone else mentioned. You need to use your rotation to drive your hand/arm into the water and prevent the braking effect. My coach used to always say "don't swim like a barge, swim like a scull

-Work on your kick. Every triathlete that comes into swimming for triathlon needs to. Remember to kick from your hip, not the knee.