Did any of you catch the final of the 1500M? I was counting 31-33 strokes (per 50M) for the top two finishers. They appeared to glide quite a bit so after reading the other thread I’m wondering if you all would consider this is be similar to the TI style that so many triathletes swear by?
Dave from VA
Hackett has a bit of weird front quadrant-rear quadrant lope at times, but I think of Larsen Jensen as very TI representative.
This is not intended to be rude but as a former world top 50 I am humored by the way those that have come to the TRI ranks from running and cycling view “my” sport. This TI thing is simply a marketing spin thrown together so that a simplistic version of freestyle could be sold in a convinent package. Yes, it is a wonderful tool to assist begginers in their efforts at learning a new sport but please DO NOT refer to what is being swum in the Olympic pool in Athens as TI. What you see there is a combination of beautiful raw talent, a natural feel for the water and refinement brought about by 10’s of thousands of hours in the pool. When I am asked “how I do it” i cannot really say. I really dont know, i just “do”. In the water i am in my element and i intuitively “know” what to do. I never think about pressing the “T” or my chest. I dont dwell on my kick and what it is doing… i just go. Such is the case with the athletes you are watching on TV. They know the water and the water knows them… The principles that guide them DO NOT relate to begining swimmers. They are governed by a whole other set of hydrodynamic rules… their natural talent and feel for the water have allowed them to reach that point.
it sure was front quadrant swimming and gliding by hackett. if that’s ti than he sure as hell was doing it.
I enjoyed his performance in the 1500m catch-up 
.
I’d like to say I saw all of it, but NBC in it’s infinite wisdom cut away for a commercial break so I missed a good chunk of the middle. But, hey, they at least gave me an earful of Maurice Greene after he won his heat (yawn).
“This is not intended to be rude but as a former world top 50 I am humored by the way those that have come to the TRI ranks from running and cycling view “my” sport.”
You have mentioned your former top-50 world status repeatedly in various threads without specifying which event. Maybe I missed a thread but I haven’t seen this. Sorry, but I just don’t recall seeing the name “aus_tri” in the world swimming rankings.
Props to you for your achievements, though, and it’s nice to have a top swimmer like you both mixing it up in triathlon and with the posters on this board.
This is not intended to be rude but as a former world top 50 I am humored by the way those that have come to the TRI ranks from running and cycling view “my” sport. This TI thing is simply a marketing spin thrown together so that a simplistic version of freestyle could be sold in a convinent package. Yes, it is a wonderful tool to assist begginers in their efforts at learning a new sport but please DO NOT refer to what is being swum in the Olympic pool in Athens as TI.
That is a beautiful post. Thank you.
it sure was front quadrant swimming and gliding by hackett. if that’s ti than he sure as hell was doing it.
Oh man. Maybe TI is saying “swim like Hackett.”
If that’s Hackett, then they sure as hell are doing it.
“aus_tri” put enough personal info in his profile (which is cool) to figure out that he was a damn fast 200 flyer in the late 90s. No worries about those credentials, but it also looks like he’s a 23-year-old who has finished exactly one half-Ironman and no IM races. Not sure I really care about his opinion on tri-related swimming issues…
That said, I was a HS All American swimmer before aus_tri was born, and appreciate that Terry Laughlin has “packaged up” some drills and suggested ways to improve swim times by focusing on reducing drag over increasing brute strength by simply pounding out more yards.
As anyone who has children probably knows, people are capable of missing a message when they hear it over and over from a familiar voice (i.e. my old coach couldn’t help me improve my freestyle stroke when I was younger) – but when someone else says the same thing, all of a sudden it “clicks” (i.e. TI was just another way to remind me to rotate my core/hips, improve my catch via “front quadrant” swimming, etc.).
Still a sub-60 IM swimmer, and have even more fun blowing by “pure” swimmers who haven’t made the transition to being a triathlete yet. Particularly in Kona…
-Mike