This is one of the all-time most hilarious topics of all time on ST. A bunch of mainly BOP swimmers justifying their poor technique and now the new, added twist of competent swimmers being elitist jerks for saying one should flip turn.

It's as simple as this: You want to be a better swimmer? Swim with better swimmers. Chances are they flip turn, or you eventually will work up to a lane where they do. Try open turns in that environment and you will collide with people, disrupt the set, or otherwise negatively impact the lane. Learn to flip out of necessity, swim with those faster than you and get faster yourself. Or, just be happy with your BOP status and carry on status quo. And by "you," I mean the collective "you" that don't flip turn and argue against doing them, not you as OP.

If you need additional motivation, contemplate the OP's signature next time you're at the pool.

What the heck is "the hypoxic effect"? Is there some physiological adaptation that occurs when holding one's breath? Maybe you can just stand there and hold your breath and get the same effect? Or maybe hold your breath while running to get this effect?

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"Go yell at an M&M"

That was atrocious. I sucked.. Too shallow, too deep, came off sideways, ext.

And the worst part. When I was done I realized I was SEA SICK.

I have been eating saltine crackers for two hours now.. UGH..

Yesterday, I was a rockstar setting a personal record for a 1000 TT.. Today, I couldn't swim a whole lap.

I STILL hate you guys.

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Austin Hardy -

but you were able to flip, right? The rest is just details...

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I flipped alright.. Sometimes straight, sometimes sideways, sometimes a little more than a flip. sometimes a little less.

My stomach is still flipping.

I'll figure it out if I put my mind to it.

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Austin Hardy -

how many times did you hit your heels on deck? I managed to do that a few times as a kid, and once or twice in college when my goggles filled up on a sprint set.

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Same here, usually lasts a few days... So I quit trying to flip.

Doesn't it also matter what stroke you're doing? Sure I've tried flip turns when doing butter or breast, but it's certainly not more efficient there.

No one's a rock star on their first day of practice.

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Take a short break from ST and read my blog:
http://tri-banter.blogspot.com/

breast is hard because you'll run out of air on the pullout, but if you can time it right, a flip in fly is faster. It's hard to time though, because we never do it in practice.

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Because there's no wall to flip on in the middle of Lake Winne at Timberman.

Seriously though, I can do it, I just don't like the way I feel after the hard push off. I like the even pace when I swim without flip turns, more like OWS.

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-Alex

what does the flip turn have to do with the evenness of your pace?

I'm of the opinion that the flipturn doesn't really matter a heck of a lot if you are looking at it solely from a training effect, but if you are swimming with a squad, not doing them is disruptive to the flow of the lane, and it's good to learn them anyway just from a body awareness perspective.

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I just swim by myself, so that's no problem. I can do them, but as far as pace goes, I feel like my breathing and HR get wonky when I turn, so like I said, I feel less even.

Entirely possible it's just my perception, I just like the even-need of tapping the wall, spinning and pushing off.

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-Alex

the continued swimming into flip turn and out more accurately mimics OWS than open turns.

suck at them as much as I do and there won't be a drastic pace change

At the end of the day, this. The whole "there's no walls in OW" argument kinda falls apart unless you're doing OW swims with 180 degree turns every 25 yds/meters. So you might as well swim in a way that keeps your body in the proper position better (i.e., flips)

Feels like a Friday, a 5 page flip turn thread just started today. These are always fun to read as people tend to have quite emotional responses

Fixed that for you.

Flip or don't flip, it doesn't matter unless:

• You are racing in a pool
• Your are training with a fast group (or really any group where everyone else is flipping)
  

As for pace and effort, you are never moving faster in the water than when you are on your back under water just pushing off the wall.

As for learning them (I learned then on the 6th grade swim team) if you are swimming a reasonable amount of yardage (5000 or more a week) in a SCY pool, depending on the length of your sets, you are probably turning off the wall 300 times or more a week. I would think that a little effort and tenacity would enable almost anyone to learn a skill after repeating it 300 times a week for a couple of weeks.

Monday night I did inverse ladders from 50 yards to 400 and back in a mostly empty pool. In the pool was a kids swim practice, and their coach was sending them off so they could "race" me at various lengths. Some of them could beat me to the wall, but I could come off the wall a whole body length ahead of them every time because they couldn't flip yet. It makes a big difference in your SCY/M times. So if you are trying to compare yourself to information posted on ST, you need to understand that most, if not all the people posting fast times are flipping. You will have to work a lot harder to do that with an open turn. In fact, the faster you are coming into the wall, the hard it is to do an open turn and the easier it is to flip.

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"...the street finds its own uses for things"

Plus, doing an open wall turn feels like the buoy turns at any WTC race. Raise you head up, grab onto something and kick off something. Sometime those are the same "somethings"!

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John Behme
Charlotte, NC

sea sick? I get motion sick very easy and I've never had this experience or herd of it from someone learning to flip turn.

Are you tumbling and rolling at the same time? That is the only thing I can think of that would make you sick and cause you to come off the wall in the wring direction.

You should be doing two sepearte motions at the two separate times in the turn. Tumble as you come into the wall, when your feet hit the wall you should be looking straight up at the ceiling. Then push off the wall and as you are stream lining through the water do a barrel roll.

I'm a former child club swimmer (3 sessions per week for years when I was growing up, competitions every weekend) who is now getting back into it. I've been swimming again since January after about 15 years break.

Speed has come back pretty fast, but I can't do tumble turns on every length - I'm too unfit (run out of breath) but also I get cramp in my calves. I don't know why but it doesn't happen with "open" turns (as they seem to be called). And the cramps are BAD - as in have to end the session and still feel it several days later bad... So I tend to steer clear of the flip turns.

Incidentally I tried a flip turn from back to breast stroke the other day - used to do those all the time - hit my head on the bottom and felt pretty stupid ;-)

Ok, OK...I feel shamed! I am trying to talk myself into it...I used to be a one side breather....now I bilateral breathe...so I guess even an old guy can learn to flip turn. I am joining my first masters team in 4 weeks so I got 4 weeks to perfect this - or at least be good enough...going for it!

this was only first article that came up . . . http://www.alexandriamasters.com/articles/hypoxic.htm

and emil zatopek actually used to run holding his breath . . . maybe i'll try that next. then again he also used to run in place in his bath tub in army boots . . . i'm not that hard core.

I do them simply because they put you in a really nice rhythm when churning out lap after monotonous lap.......and I think they look cool when doing them in a plum smuggler!

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"I would definitely smell her seat after a century ride"

From the TI article you linked:

"because while breath-control sets may not convey any TRAINING effect, they may still have a LEARNING effect. "

So you agree there is no training adaptation from doing hypoxic work.

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"Go yell at an M&M"

perhaps you should read the entire article instead of the one sentence that supports your view.

I think ken summed it up quite well. The article pretty clearly says that there is no physiological (ie fitness) effect from hypoxic swimming sets.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

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