$5 is expensive???? Most are $7, one is $10, another is $440 for a 3 month membership, etc., etc.

I wish the SF pool would work, but sadly, I am at the office well before then and until well after!

Lorenzo -- You lucky dude. No wetsuits allowed in Hawaii.

Re: swimming slow. Trouble is, as a serious sinker, I simply cannot go at that lazy, cruiser pace that some others do. I'm literally underwater when I try. I'm balanced -- nice and level -- but to breathe, I have to pull extra hard to get high enough and roll farther.

I've tried the pull buoy (yuck!), probably should more. I use zoomers sometimes, which gets me higher in the water and lets me cruise. But that's cheating! I could probably go 2x or 3x as far that way.

You know, despite all this, I still kinda dig swimming (though I hate peeling myself off the warm sofa after dark to swim in <45 degree weather). A good length of 25, where it comes together, feels great. And I like the challenge of doing something that seems ridiculously hard.

I'll look into that Florida sitch. Wish I could find that in California!

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Too f@ckin depressed from various injuries to care about having a signature line.

Sponsored by Blue Shield PPO.

Wow, I hardly ever charge people at work because I feel bad about $3 a day or $30 a month. Maybe I am just a cheap bastard.

They actully have certain hours during the day thats it is a 50m pool w/ fewer lanes at USF and a lady there gives lesson and she is amazing Allison Wagner. I worked w/ her last summer and learned how to swim for the first time in my life.

Dan

Lorenzo--I could have written that myself. Same tale of woe. :(

Are you able to get to a pool and watch elite swimmers practice? If you can, get to a Cal practice, a Stanford practice, a USC practice, etc. See if the coach will just let you sit in the stands and watch the masters at work. You will gain a lot of knowledge by watching these swimmers. Cal, Stanford and USC all have top notch programs.

You shouldn't be sinking. If you are, it means that you are likely very tense in the water and are trying to "muscle" your way through it instead of gently gliding through. Work on total relaxation in the water. I have some of the people I coach do a lot of kicking on their back. I find people can relax more if they don't have their face in the water. I have them kick a 25 on their back, and then simply turn over and keep kicking on their front. The goal is to maintain the relaxation they had on their back when they turn over. It has been working very well so far.

If you are in the Oakland area, let me know. I have a friend who coaches a local swim club there and he is outstanding. He could help you out. But, it seems like if you already have 2 coaches available, they should be teaching your properly. Admittedly, I am not a big fan of TI.

Uptown, I'm on the other side of the bay. Too far to Oakland other than for a lesson or two.

I'm actually fairly relaxed in the water. And if I make an effort to relax more, I actually sink more. Here's an example... If I submerge at the wall and pushoff, where others slowly float to the surface, I just stay submerged. Or doing the TI Zipperskate drill, the moment my elbow begins to break the surface of the water, down I go. I laughed at the TI DVD when the narrator (Laughlin?) notes that one of the swimmers is a "sinker" as she Zipperskates and drops an inch or two in the water. Ha! I drop at least a foot. I'm balanced, though!

I don't think there's anything wrong w/ TI. Something's wrong with me!

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Too f@ckin depressed from various injuries to care about having a signature line.

Sponsored by Blue Shield PPO.

This has me thinking... perhaps I should still consider that week, once I can make use of it (i.e., I've improved enough to benefit from even more woork in the pool). It's the coaching/instruction that I should add.

Someone mentioned Rich Strauss above. This leads me to another question... with this idea in mind (50m pool + instruction), who would be the best for me to spend time (and money!) with? Perhaps I should start a separate thread on that.

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Too f@ckin depressed from various injuries to care about having a signature line.

Sponsored by Blue Shield PPO.

Re sinking. I sink if I exhale all the way. With a full breath I float. Perhaps a fuller breath will help. I'm a bad swimmer, but I've heard that swimmers tend to exhale and inhale rapidly, which would increase buoyancy.



Styrrell

Not taking a deep breath will blow you up pretty quick, and breathing fast means you have to pick up the shoulder rotation, which is easier said than done, and so you start with the shorter strokes and it all goes downhill from there.

Aztec be patient - I can run 6:10 pace & ride a half IM at over 23 mph, but I get beat out of the water by 10-year-old girls who weigh 40 pounds who have awesome technique.

I think swimming is 90% technique, 5% fitness & 5% attitude. It's not a natural thing for us to do, & you simply need to do it a LOT in order to get better. Some people's bodies are better suited to it sure - I sink straight to the bottom after taking a deep breath of air - but anyone can learn to be efficient.

When I began two years ago & couldn't stay swimming freestyle for a whole race, now I come out mid pack. This was almost completely due to technique - finding someone to watch my stroke & telling me what to fix.

Oh, and the 5% attitude I mentioned above is this -- the runners & bikers out there know how to really push themsleves while running & biking, but in the water it's not so easy to push out of the comfort zone because you're scared of the possibility of drowning. Learn how to put that fear aside & really push the hell out of yourself and you'll be a better swimmer.

Bingo. I never get a full deep breath. More like a quick shallow one. By the end of the 50, I am breathing on both sides of the stroke (i.e., with every shoulder rotation). But when I breathe more fully, it takes too long, I see my hand passing my head! And then I get lectured from the coach for turning over too slow!

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Too f@ckin depressed from various injuries to care about having a signature line.

Sponsored by Blue Shield PPO.

When do you begin to exhale?

How long have you been at this?

I begin to exhale right as my mouth starts to come out of the water.

Kidding! Actually, I sort of leak air out slowly once my face is back down. I keep exhaling at a slow/medium pace (I don't really think about it much and just go with what feels natural now). I don't think I'm fully exhaled by the time I inhale, and since I can't waste time exhaling once my mouth has reached air, I take in what I can get. Fairly often on the right side, I get some water with that yet manage not to get it into the lungs. The more I think about it, I'd guess I get 75% of a breath to the left, maybe 25% of one to the right.

I started TI drills back in late summer when it was warm and toasty. 2 or so pool visits per week. Then in mid-October, having gotten almost nowhere, I started up 3/week with a masters group.

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Too f@ckin depressed from various injuries to care about having a signature line.

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Here's a tip ---- if you can't breath well to one side, don't breath to that side.

You are living proof of the fact that anything you have heard about a need to breathe to both sides to "balance" your stroke is complete and utter BS.

Wow.

I don't breathe well to that side because I suck at it. That's no reason to not build better breathing there. A month ago I couldn't breathe on either side. In another month, I expect to be able to breathe equally well on both sides.

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Too f@ckin depressed from various injuries to care about having a signature line.

Sponsored by Blue Shield PPO.

I am really no one to give advice, but I don't think swim coaches and other people who can swim really feel our pain. They are heartless and unfeeling. They mock us. Try doing what you are doing but expel the rest hard as your mouth is coming out of the water. Don't just keep topping off the bad air with a little good air--you won't be getting enough O2 and your aerobic system won't be able to your muscles what they need to rotate, pull and kick...and call for help.

The thought I hold onto is what someone told me when I started: Its all about the breathing.

Let me throw inone other thing, that may or may not be true, its just my belief--your body will find the most economical way to do whatever it is being tasked to do, over time, and so the other piece of advice is JFS, and let your body figure it out.

Very sound advice. Tonight I will take that as my #1 focal point, like a pre-swing thought in golf. If my body has zero fatigue, yet I'm sucking in O2 at the wall like I just ran a 1:02 400meter, I must be overestimating the quality of my breathing.

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Too f@ckin depressed from various injuries to care about having a signature line.

Sponsored by Blue Shield PPO.

Aztec, "sinkers" should focus on a quick turnover and less 'down-time' between propulsions (tempo style). Try finding your center of mass (in your upper chest, you need to lean into the water). You can do this by focusing on balance drills (kicking on your side and back, as someone else suggested as well) in every swim session, improving your lean into the water (chest down/hips up). You can do some pull sets with a buoy, leaning into the water and staying long. For instance, 5x100 pull at a moderate pace. Count your strokes. Take the average of the four (round down). This is your goal stroke rating for regular swimming -- anything more strokes means you are lifting your head/shoulders.

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“You can't coach desire.” --Dathan Ritzenhein
http://xtreme4.com/ -- an extreme ride for extreme change: go green

Swimming is not figure skating. You do not get style points. If you can't breath to both sides without killing yourself, don't do it. If you are faster and more comfortable breathing to one side, swim that way for a few months than, if you insist, go back to trying to breath to both sides. You'll be a lot stronger swimmer then and it may come easier.

Despite what you may have been led to believe, virtually all fast freestylers strongly favor one side for breathing and to the extent they breathe both ways, they do it for tactical reasons, not for stroke mechanics. Unless you really need to see on your weak side what is going on several lanes over, don't breath that way, at least until you have totally mastered breathing on the side that comes most naturally to you.

You should be able to comfortably bilaterally breathe every 3 and every 5 strokes while swimming a couple hundred yards at a relaxed pace. Think of it as basic swim competence. You want to be able to comfortably breathe both sides if you have to- navigation or dealing with waves and currents and such sometimes dictates breathing on oneside or the other.

Once you can breathe both sides when you have to, train and race breathing whatever pattern ends up feeling most comfortable to you. You'll naturally figure out what works best/most efficiently for you when you test your stroke under stressful conditions.

This is an interesting thread......to bring up another can of worms, send a PM to Ironguide for this thoughts on the subject.....he knows whats hes talking about.

Forget the swim camp, in my opinion. Swim camps are about milegage, hard yards....you will not be capable of them and as someone said, will end up swimming 50% maybe more very fatigued as your body trys to cope with the massive overload of swim time.

When you can handle swim sessions - 3-5k of intervals - swim camps, wow, best thing in the world. I have one from 17th-24th Dec. 2hrs 5.30-7.30, 30mins conditioning. back to the pool at 3 for another 2hrs. Everyday. Might even add a few to crack that magic 100k barrier.....

BUT....im not a very good swimmer, but Iv learned alot from very good coaches - the best infact.

I would advise, if you were my athlete -

To get in the pool and swim pull, all the time. 90% min.

AND USE 2 PULL BOUYS - get your legs right up. your head down. If your body position (from sounds of the posts) is a limiting factor, experience the joy of swimming like a swimmer!

Lie in the water like this, and breathing will become effortless. Bi-lateral - Watch Athens, how man bi-lateral triathletes? Maybe to check out the opposition now and again....

If your going to slow to 'swim relaxed' crack those zoomers on....

I think it is very very poignant for you to say you have been on lots of TI etc courses, and have not cracked a 50m without feeling out of breath. It says alot I think. Swimming is simple, dont make it complicated.

Not that it matters. When I started I wouldnt have swum 10.00 for a 400 free....Never enjoyed the benefit of a swim club. I followed these ideas and developed them (I use 2pull bouys and a band for 80% of my swimming - not just main sets). I now swim under 5.00 - I tried lots of fancy styles and techniques.....I hated it when I found out, but the simplest ideas worked.

Hope some of that helps and dosent sound like preaching!

Swift.

PLEASE DON'T TAKE MY ADVICE. I stink at swimming. Figure what I am saying is what I might tell a buddy to just get him to be able to make a 2.4 mile swim and survive so he can have the joy of a 112 bike and 26.2 mile run.

Other people are posting up now, and they actually know what they are talking about--I would listen to them before my BS.



See what I mean about Heartless? Jill wants you to get thrown overboard about two miles out so you can "test your stroke under stressful conditions". Heartless. Uncaring.

On another front--have you tried swimming with a wetsuit yet. This added buoyancy will give you the false impression that you can swim, sort of like the pull buoy, but better. If nothing else you will get the feeling of how your body should be going through the water, and the form of the suit helps hold you in the right position. I am ten seconds faster per 50 yards in the pool in a wetsuit--evern faster after about a mile, because my arms have tired (without the wetsuit) from pulling a bad body position through the water. Try to remember that position when you swim without it--people talk about "pressing the "T"" and swimming downhill, I also try to think about arching my back somewhat like there is a stick in my...nevermind--it is the position the wetsuit holds you in.

After the thought that "Its all about the breathing", the next most important is "Its all about the body position". This --- goes through the water much better than this "/"--and it is your poor weak little stinking arms that are having to do all that extra work.

I meant to post this a few days ago. Aztec, get a new coach!

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"Yeah, no one likes a smartass, but we all like stars" - Thom Yorke


smartasscoach.tri-oeiras.com

Two miles out if the great whites are present. If not, three miles from shore :)

or

5-10 x100 swum anaerobic on an interval that gives you about 20 seconds rest after every 100.

Pick which one sounds best to you. Swim hard once in a while, and see how your stroke changes when you go hard. Remember that there really is little consensus in swimming- it's a sport that's never managed to decide whether a lap is one or two lengths. Same applies to strokes- you'd never conscoiusly try to teach Yuri Prilukov to swim Like That, but after millions of meters, he's got an incredibly fast distance freestyle stroke that manages to go against a lot of conventional wisdom about that discipline.