I'm an adult onset swimmer who has been at it for about 5 years. My first year or two I got some lessons, improved my fitness significantly and then rather plateaued. Since then I've been using lots of different videos and suggestions from folks to improve but hadn't seen a whole lot of growth overall. To be clear, I could certainly finish 1,000 yard swim a bit faster than I could 4 years ago but that was mostly down to just being fitter overall.

This past season I had 2 downright terrible open water swims to start of triathlons, one being my first 70.3. That swim was so bad that I rolled onto my back for a while, got out with quad spasms and considered just calling the race done at that point. I didn't and the rest of the race went well but these two swims made me decide that I needed to change. After taking a bit of time out of the pool to get my head right around it I started back up with my usual 3 swims per week for about 2 months with a focus on a few areas that I thought I needed to work on. These included improving my body rotation, my catch and working on being 'taut'--ie keeping my body long and straight rather than wet noodling it. I did a bunch of drills each workout -- much more than previously to focus on these areas.

Since then I've jumped into a masters swim group. The masters workouts have been great, have made me work on other strokes which seems to be helping my freestyle as well. This past week, in working on 'endurance freestyle' the coach focused on a couple of ideas. 1.(for myself and one other) improving our shoulder angle in the reach part of the stroke to extend further upon entry into the water 2. Building a 2 beat kick 3. Working on a 'gallop stroke'. For one reason or another the reach seemed to click pretty well for me and I was told that my stroke immediately looked much better! Moving into part 2 and 3 this seemed to continue, which is great. The questions that I have are:
1. How do I make sure that I am consistently 'reaching' to the right degree
2. How on earth do I keep this 2 beat kick without fins? It feels like my legs will sink without the movement.
3. Should I use the 'gallop' stroke, which feels good (and fast) all the time or should I build in time to practice that as well as the long, slow, stretchy version?
4. I've been avoiding doing math and tracking times this week with the idea that I may need to cement these skills before I worry about time and improvement. Is this the right approach and if so, how long do I avoid the clock and just focus on technique?

Lots of questions. Feel free to answer any that interest you!

thanks

I've been reading this thread any trying to implement the recommendations to various degrees. There was a pretty big breakthrough through a few weeks of dedicated videos and reviewing (~18 months swimming, 1k scy at 15:16), but I'm still left with two big questions where my stroke seems to "work" but doesn't seems right.

--When going from the catch to the pull, I've really taken emphasis off of the catch and forcibly pushing back, almost like how you'd push yourself up onto the pool deck from the deep end. It kind of really feels like two separate motions, a lazy (but well placed) catch that just kind of drops the hand immediately turning into a strong push straight back. It's hard to see clearly in video where the transition takes place, but it feels like a well defined switch in the stroke. Is it worth trying to smooth this out? And if so, would you smooth it out by being more forceful on the catch or less forceful at the start of the pull?

--Arching back, specifically, with a flatter back the upper arm to spine angle is much flatter and my shoulders work noticeably harder to pull that arm to the flatter angle. It seems the real culprit for the arching back is the desire to keep the shoulder joint more extended and less flexed (at a lesser angle in relation to the spine). I'm guessing this is just something to get used to and keep working on?

This thread is truly a goldmine.

Hi Andrew,

I took your advise and start the squads with the Tri club. Coach is very good and keep providing me with advise here and there but I know that I need some special attention so I joined stroke correction swim school. two weeks now but not feeling really great with the school coach, however will give it another two weeks and see.
The Tri coach gave me an advise and need your comment please.
Coach asked me to use snorkel with fins/buoy to focus only on my stroke.specifically my pull which seems not strong enough ( I push back so hard but not sure why it's not strong enough). After I fix my technique I need to worry about my breathing. does that make sense?
any idea how the pull should looks like?
I had too much water in my nose and lungs from the snorkel probably I should use nose clip next time.
overall, I feel great that I'm back in the pool. Thanks again

Thanks for the reply - got me thinking about the kick since reading it

I don’t really have any other questions at the moment just a bunch of comments and observations

Which are too boring to anyone but myself

Mainly about kick creating a lot of drag, only worth the potential extra speed seemingly in the 800 and up for men and 400 and up for women

Back in the 80s the world record in the 400 was 2 beat but things changed a lot since then.

But wonder how fast the 2 beat kick men would go now - if the distance guys sprinted on their 2 beat strokes at 400 and 200s. Faster than the 80s but how much slower than the current times

Ill take a stab at this:

from a wider perspective... you're swimming from "outside" to "in" meaning you are focusing on the arm movement being the driver for propulsion and breathing. Changing that perspective to "inside to out" thinking helps and answers your tech question.

The breath is timed w the rotation of the hips and shoulders. Rotation needs to be rhythmical and symmetrical. So breathing on either side should not be an issue. The answer and for improved feedback would be to start timing your breath w your rotation (not arms) and also breathing on both sides but primarily the "weak" side as your brain wiring has less experience to override. A final note, the quality of your inhale is dictated by the quality of your exhale, no matter the side you breath on... so consider and practice this as well.

Good luck

DaveD

I have a question about swim technique I'm hoping a ST expert can answer. My question is about the timing of the catch with the regard to taking a breath. For a right-side breather, does the left-arm catch start as the head finishes the breath and turns back toward the water? Put another way, what is the head doing when the catch starts?

I ask because I am not very good at EVF, or swimming for that matter. I notice that when I practice EVF on dryland, the slight rotation of shoulder and the dropping of my forearm rotates me from my side back toward being flatter on my belly. But when I saw myself on video, I noticed that I was starting the left arm catch while still rotating onto my left side and turning my head right to breathe. Maybe I work at cross purposes with myself. My left arm is trying to rotate my body back to flat while my core is still trying to turn onto the left side. My left hand sort of waves around as I start the catch and I struggle to get an EVF, maybe that's the reason.

I experimented with breathing a little earlier and quicker so that I pretty much complete the breath while my left arm was extended. I tried to not start the catch until I was turning my head back toward the water and my recovery arm was past my head. I did this by trying to think about a connection between my left elbow and my right shoulder-- the elbow goes up and shoulder comes forward to my ear.

It seemed to help, but I wanted to get a sense of whether I'm on the right track. I've watched a lot of videos and it seems like some swimmers are into the pull phase before their face is back in the water, while others start the catch and pull later so that the eyes are looking at the bottom of the pool when the pull starts.

If you're rotated to the right, you're going to struggle to get into an effective pulling position. Pulling too soon while breathing is a pretty common mistake, and swimmers end up in with a poor pull on that side. You'll often see 'sculling' on that hand as noted.

A faster breath and a more patient pull can help solve that issue. If you're slow in getting the head back down, many times it's because you're 'looking' or 'watching' what's happening over the surface, even if it's not conscious. Closing your eyes when you breath and then opening them back up when your head is back underwater can help.

Hope that was useful.

Andrew

That sounds great. Did you "realize" this bc of what I wrote? or on your own?
daved

Yes, that is helpful and you described my problem better than I did. My left arm looked like I was taught to start the catch with a quick scull. Despite knowing it was there, I couldn't eliminate that excess motion until I implemented a faster breath and more patient catch and pull.



I realized my problem by practicing EVF on the poolside and via single arm drills. I think that helped me start to feel physically the connection to my core. Then, when I watched myself on video I realized my core and catch were at odds with each other. Your explanation helped me think it through, understand how I my focus of the last couple of months on the arm and hand (rather than the core) was misdirected.