Hi all,
A quick swimming Q.
After seeing my underwater footage I know I tend to enter the water, reach out, drop the elbow, then have to correct etc.
According to Mr Friel this is a very common problem, he calls it the death move. In response to this he says he coaches his swimmers to enter at a much steeper angle with fingers pointed towards the bottom of the pool, rather than reaching forward with a straight arm.
This also seems like it would work better for swimming in a suit, as the more you stretch forward the more the material will pull and fatigue the arms/back.
So, I have been practicing this and its going well, I think. But I am noticing sometimes I feel a pressure on the back of my forearm (as in the side pointing away from me).
This would indicate that my arm is vertical and stationary as I am moving forward, and this is bad as its providing significant resistance against the water.
To fix this should I A) Pull sooner? So pull almost as soon as my hand/arm are in the water or B) Not go in quite as vertical and stretch out a little more. or C) another answer entirely!
In general, a steeper entry angle is fine as long as your stroke rate is high enough, but whether or not it’s an effective technique for you…check the clock.
Wetsuit material pulling and creating excess fatigue is something you reduce by buying a wetsuit that is designed to reduce such pulling through use of proper materials, material thickness, etc. Buying a wetsuit that fits properly. Wearing the wetsuit correctly with material pulled to the area you need free range of motion. Being willing to recover a bit more to the outside and with a bit straighter arm…experiment by degree with this. Finally, arm recovery should be a “controlled throw” such that it is 95% momentum that carries it forward at the point where wetsuit material might begin to pull. If you’ve got excess tension in your arm at entry during a long distance swim event…you need to ask yourself why. Fast swimming is as much about resting and relaxing whenever and wherever it is not immediately necessary to generate high force and sustained power. I’m guessing a relatively high cadence along with a more relaxed recovery will alleviate what you feel on the back (outside?) of your forearm as well. Either you get EVF out front and learn to catch water high and figure out what is a pretty awkward (at first) movement pattern, or you dig for a catch lower and immediately go into your pull, making up for the shorter DPS with a higher cadence.
Thank you for the detailed reply.
I think you are right, I will need to increase stroke rate to compensate. I will keep an eye on whether this gets me faster.
I was watching a video of Jodie swallow earlier who does this and here stroke rate is very high.
Thank you for the detailed reply.
I think you are right, I will need to increase stroke rate to compensate. I will keep an eye on whether this gets me faster.
I was watching a video of Jodie swallow earlier who does this and here stroke rate is very high.
I think part of your problem as well is your focusing too much on your arm…You can really only do so much with your arm…You have probably figured this out…and to be honest you probably don’t feel all that much more powerful and smooth…but you might just feel what it is like to not drop your elbow with an overexaggerated hand entry…I have found that focusing on your arms still gets you using your arm and shoulder muscles to pull instead of your back and rotation
…Loading the back muscle (lat) on hand entry and extension is the key and then that rotates or snaps you back to center…(true rotation and leverage)…I heard coaches talk about reaching over the barrel…that analogy didn’t really work for me until I felt what it was like to swim with high shoulders. I had someone who is a really elite (high quality) coach help my freestyle over the course of about 6 months.
One thing that could possibly help is too swim heads up for 5 strokes swim head normal postion for 5 stokes…When you are heads up just keep you eyes out of the water not you entire head lifted up…and when you breath while heads up still breath to the side and lay your face in the water like you would normally breath…pay attention to where your arms and shoulds are while heads up and still try to get good hip rotation out the back…Then try to settle back down in to the most relaxed head down normal freestyle position on the other 5 strokes…Do this in 200’s…
Just a thought to get you to swim by feeling the water out in front of you with your shoulders in a pretty neutral (biomechanically speaking), but high in the water…