I’m horrible at swimming. My IM swim times are horrible: 90 minutes at IM Switzerland, and a little under 2 hours in the choppy waters of Silverman. Half IM times in calmer waters are around 42-45 minutes, depending how many times i get off course.
I force myself to swim, but I don’t feel I’m enjoying it while I’m doing it. I have bigger thighs, which I believe leads to floating issues. When I swim, my legs are not horizontal, but they make an angle downwards. I can correct this if I push my upper body/head down into the water lots, but that leads to other float issues when breathing.
I’m looking at some of the Total Immersion clinics that’ll be visiting San Francisco soon. Realistically, how much of the above would it fix? My goal is to fix my technique and come out of the water not completely depleted for the bike/run.
Has anyone with similar swimming problems who has been to a clinic found an improvement?
I’m horrible at swimming. My IM swim times are horrible: 90 minutes at IM Switzerland, and a little under 2 hours in the choppy waters of Silverman. Half IM times in calmer waters are around 42-45 minutes, depending how many times i get off course.
I force myself to swim, but I don’t feel I’m enjoying it while I’m doing it. I have bigger thighs, which I believe leads to floating issues. When I swim, my legs are not horizontal, but they make an angle downwards. I can correct this if I push my upper body/head down into the water lots, but that leads to other float issues when breathing.
I’m looking at some of the Total Immersion clinics that’ll be visiting San Francisco soon. Realistically, how much of the above would it fix? My goal is to fix my technique and come out of the water not completely depleted for the bike/run.
Has anyone with similar swimming problems who has been to a clinic found an improvement?
You’re going to get one of three responses. Yes, absolutely, No, never, or haven’t done it but I’ve heard…
TI is one of those things that people either love or hate. I haven’t done it (So I’m option #3 :D) but if you aren’t a strong swimmer, almost ANY basic instruction is a good thing. If you don’t want to drop the $$ for a TI camp, find a good instructor in your area.
Turtle, can you get down to San Diego? ironguides Coach Sergio Borges offers Open Water stroke improvement coaching.
Technique-perfect pool swimming is a “controlled” environment, far from what happens in the open water in the middle of a triathlon – we focus on helping you swim better in triathlon races and open water.
At ironguides we teach open water swimming that helps you swim with more power and “oomph” through the water, and have great success reforming those who come out of months of TI swim training without going faster. You can reach sergio at sergio@ironguides.net to ask more questions if you have them.
Hi-
I did Total Immersion in 2001. It was a decent intro to freestyle. I was so new to swimming back then that I didn’t know better.
However, I’ve become a serious swimmer… although not great, I’ve shaved my time by about 25% since learning TI, but by practicing other techniques.
TI is a good method for someone whose goal is to:
1.) Swim very long distances
2.) Finish an IM
That said, I would recommend a steady, experienced coach or lessons from a singular, qualified individual. The money spent is about the same (TI v. personal instruction).
Becoming a good swimmer requires power & good technique rather than logging miles.
I did a TI workshop in July in NC. Looking back all we really did were the drill that you can youtube and get from the books. Basically all they do is film you as soon as ou get into the pool and the last day. that was a good insight. I think if i was to spend 450 on swimming i think i would hire a coach for a few of 1 hour sessions to watch just me from the deck…give me some drills and key points to work on…go back and refine them and see him again like every two weeks or something like that.
For what you’d spend on a TI camp you could get a LOT of great, 1-on-1 instruction as well as membership with a good Masters program. I hear there’s one in Burlingame that’s really solid. As for coaches, ask the SF crew - they’ll hook you up with a good one.
Note that I’m not saying that you won’t get anything out of a TI camp - just that you’ll get a LOT more for the same amount of money spent elsewhere.
I did private, one on one instruction with a TI instructor 2.5 years ago, prior to my first sprint triathlon. Like fastwitchies said, it’s a good introduction to freestyle swimming. It gets you feeling relaxed and balanced in the water. They attempt to strip you of everything that you have ever learned about swimming and start over from zero, doing a lot of specific drills and almost no actual swimming.
TI may be the best for some, and it did get me through my first tri, although I did need to resort to breast stroke for part of the way, which I considered cheating on my personal goal, which was to swim the entire swim freestyle; I did get through it, though.
My greatest progress came from finding an excellent collegiate swimmer/triathlete who helped me with my stroke and got me swimming and since then, (just over a year ago) doing tons of drills on my own and spending time in the pool.
I wouldn’t yet feel comfortable in a Master’s group, something lots of people on Slowtwitch favor for building speed, but I may join one at sometime in the future. (perhaps as soon as I can master flip turns w/o getting seasick) However I do enjoy swimming on my own and I might just keep doing that.
Thus far, I have progressed from being a TERRIBLE (BOP) swimmer, who, although I was a very experienced ocean (wave) windsurfer, suffered from swim panic during every swim over 50 yds, (and especially in races) to being a still fairly slow swimmer, (MOP) who is confident I can complete any swim in a tri and feel OK coming out of the water, and who actually ENJOYS my swim workouts of ~ 3000m 3x a week. (as long as my shoulder holds together)
check your local library. Mine had the instructional dvd to borrow. This will give you plenty of drills and things to work on. Then you can decide if a class might be worth it for you. The dvd seemed pretty thorough, so it might have been the whole T1 process.