Something I questioned myself in the pool today. When I’m swimming my legs are somewhat rotated inward and my big toes point at each other. Almost looks like im pigeon toed if that makes sense. To what extent does this affect my propulsion? Something I’ve bee wondering as I get back my swim miles because when I use a pull buoy my speed is unchanged which makes me think my kick is accomplishing nothing.
If you point your toes correctly, your feet will point inward.
If there was a big difference between your swim and pull with your pull being faster then there would be a problem. I wouldn’t worry about pull and swim being even.
Not to hijack the OP, but what would be the problem if one has a faster pull than swim? This is me, and I’m curious to learn more.
Assuming by pull you mean without paddles, it could mean a couple things.. 1, your kick is so bad that it’s slowing you down. Granted pull buoyancy comes into play a little, but even the worst kick should be integrated into your stroke such that it doesn’t make you slower than you can pull arms alone. Or 2, your body position needs to be fixed because the pull buoy is possibly making up for position deficiencies.
Interesting! I never would have guessed lack of change in speed is a problem. I used to be able to pull faster. My assumption was that my kick has 0 propulsion.
So I guess I’m just fat and slow right now. Swimming around 7:50 for 500 steady warmup effort. And a huge increase in effort just to get down to 7:29 the other day. 2-3 years ago I was punching out 1k in 12:13. ![]()
If you swim a lot faster with a pull buoy, it’s a body position issue.
Guess I’ve got something to work on this winter. Thanks guys.
Don’t question yourself in the pool. Make a faster arm turn over with your water elbow high enough to take stress off your shoulder. A more productive kick will naturally follow without thinking. Buoy will raise body to faster horizontal plane. Pray for wetsuit weather. Swim with faster people.
“Don’t think, meat. Just give’m the gas!”
- Luc LaLouche