Two beat kick vs Flutter kick

Triathlon Forum
21

Swimming fast is all about body position. Most people who are not typically fast swimmers lose less time in the swim with a wetsuit bc they suit forces that correct body position. So back to kicking…a strong core is very important for body position. Also, the kick helps support this body positon. This is the same reason why non swimmers are usually better with a pull buoy- because of the forced body position.

So long story short, it is best to train with a good strong kick…do a few kick sets hard here and there. But in a race, it is ideal NOT to use the legs as much and maintain a small narrow kick. This is only benefial if you have trained the body to get that body position you need in practice.

hope this helps…probably confusing.

22

Swimming fast is all about body position. Most people who are not typically fast swimmers lose less time in the swim with a wetsuit bc they suit forces that correct body position. So back to kicking…a strong core is very important for body position. Also, the kick helps support this body positon. This is the same reason why non swimmers are usually better with a pull buoy- because of the forced body position.

So long story short, it is best to train with a good strong kick…do a few kick sets hard here and there. But in a race, it is ideal NOT to use the legs as much and maintain a small narrow kick. This is only benefial if you have trained the body to get that body position you need in practice.

hope this helps…probably confusing.

I would think that training a strong kick to help body position and then trying to not use the legs as much during a race would be a difficult balance to achieve? Race day comes along, and you “soften” the kick to save your legs, your body drops, and you go slower? I guess my question is how do you save your legs if a strong kick is essential for body position? It is more of a matter of conditioning the core to being used to kicking?

And thank you for chiming in - we love have pros bringing their perspective to the forum!

23

Yes, conditioning.

It is like to intervals on the bike in a very hard gear for strength…do you race with 60RPM? No…but it helps build th strength you need to race the way you need to

24

Swimming fast is all about body position. Most people who are not typically fast swimmers lose less time in the swim with a wetsuit bc they suit forces that correct body position. So back to kicking…a strong core is very important for body position. Also, the kick helps support this body positon. This is the same reason why non swimmers are usually better with a pull buoy- because of the forced body position.

So long story short, it is best to train with a good strong kick…do a few kick sets hard here and there. But in a race, it is ideal NOT to use the legs as much and maintain a small narrow kick. This is only benefial if you have trained the body to get that body position you need in practice.

hope this helps…probably confusing.

I would think that training a strong kick to help body position and then trying to not use the legs as much during a race would be a difficult balance to achieve? Race day comes along, and you “soften” the kick to save your legs, your body drops, and you go slower? I guess my question is how do you save your legs if a strong kick is essential for body position? It is more of a matter of conditioning the core to being used to kicking?

And thank you for chiming in - we love have pros bringing their perspective to the forum!

At risk of sounding like a broken record, it is the timing of the kick, much more than the intensity or beat of kick, that effects body position. So once the timing is correct, you can go hard, easy, 2 beat, 4 beat or 6 beat and still have most of the same positive effect on body position.

25

That makes sense. Thank you for the thoughts!

26

Swimming fast is all about body position. Most people who are not typically fast swimmers lose less time in the swim with a wetsuit bc they suit forces that correct body position. So back to kicking…a strong core is very important for body position. Also, the kick helps support this body positon. This is the same reason why non swimmers are usually better with a pull buoy- because of the forced body position.

So long story short, it is best to train with a good strong kick…do a few kick sets hard here and there. But in a race, it is ideal NOT to use the legs as much and maintain a small narrow kick. This is only benefial if you have trained the body to get that body position you need in practice.

hope this helps…probably confusing.

I would think that training a strong kick to help body position and then trying to not use the legs as much during a race would be a difficult balance to achieve? Race day comes along, and you “soften” the kick to save your legs, your body drops, and you go slower? I guess my question is how do you save your legs if a strong kick is essential for body position? It is more of a matter of conditioning the core to being used to kicking?

And thank you for chiming in - we love have pros bringing their perspective to the forum!

At risk of sounding like a broken record, it is the timing of the kick, much more than the intensity or beat of kick, that effects body position. So once the timing is correct, you can go hard, easy, 2 beat, 4 beat or 6 beat and still have most of the same positive effect on body position.

Interesting thoughts, thank you! I’ve never really paid much attention to what exactly my kick is doing - it just kind of goes. I’ll have to pay some more attention to it now. I’ve been taking part in Slowman’s guppy challenge (am I allowed to talk to you? lol!), and it’s really exciting how things are starting to come together now with this swimming stuff - I’ve been kind of going through the motions and have made some brute force improvements over time, but now it’s time to focus on the details. It’s great having people like you, Slowman, and many others on the forum!

27

Excuse my newbie question on this but when does your leg kick in a two beat kick?

On TJ Frys blog he says that the right leg would kick just as your right arm begins the pull. Some other sites on the net say the opposite - that your leg kicks when the opposite hand begins its pull.

Does it matter which?

The right leg kicking when the opposite hand pulls is a somewhat common description, and an attempt to get the kick timed properly to the arms. Depending on the style of swimming, it can work well or not at all. The thing is, this is approaching the problem in a roundabout way. It doesn’t really matter where the left arm is, as what you really want to sync your dominant right leg kick with is the finish of your right arm stroke. That may or may not happen when the left arm enters.

When the left arm enters is not what you should focus on. The efficacy of proper kick timing is highly sensitive to exactly when that kick is placed. Focusing on the opposite arm entry instead of focusing on the same side finishing the pull does not foster the refinement of kick timing nearly as well. It is that refinement of kick timing that is the primary driver of body position.

So IMO, TJ Fry’s advice is flatly incorrect while the seemingly opposite advice is closer but still misses the mark.

As stated earlier, the two beat kick is designed more for rotation and less for propulsion. So in order to effectively rotate using your kick, the bottom foot (or the foot closest to the bottom of the pool) is the one that kicks. That way the lift generated from the kick rotates you from one side to the other. If you kick with your top foot, you roll over to your back. It’s pretty simple. Having said that, if you are trying to focus on where the kick starts in relation to your pulling as opposed to where your body position is, then you can either reference the opposite arm, which may or may not be entering the water depending on your turnover/glide, or the arm on the same side, which will be beginning the meat and potatoes of the pull (and actually doing something actionable that you can reference and manipulate). The pull and kick together generate the rotation. If you are an effective kicker then you generate the rotation more from the hips and if you are weak kicker but strong puller then you rotate from the shoulders.

The right leg kicking when the opposite hand pulls is a description of a swimmer who has no rotation, as the two cancel each other out. It’s not a huge deal if that’s how you swim. You’re not going to drown or anything. You just swim flat.

But don’t take my “flatly incorrect” advice at face value if you don’t want to. I also walk the walk. Here’s a video of my stroke so you can see just what I’m talking about.

http://youtu.be/vAkzF7fPWv4

28

I didn’t mean to offend you, and that is a nice video. This point I keep repeating regarding proper kick timing is not something I made up though.

Regardless of kick frequency (2,4,6 beat), in highly proficient swimmers, the finish of each arm pull (called the upsweep by some) is nearly always timed with a kicking downbeat by the same side leg. (i.e. left arm finish, left leg downbeat).

We refer to this as “Finish Kick Timing”. This timing is so ubiquitous in elite swimming, that it is regarded in Maglischo’s book as “seldom a problem” (Maglischo, revised edition, 2003) It is important to note that Maglischo’s work was overwhelmingly based on national caliber collegiate swimmers and above.

We consistently find that in non-elite and adult onset swimmers the** inability** to naturally produce this timing is as omnipresent as the* ability* in their elite counterparts.

Getting back to your video, you are not far off. Kicking a little early is all. I suspect proper finish timing would have resulted in even faster swimming for you. Never too late.

29

I didn’t mean to offend you, and that is a nice video. This point I keep repeating regarding proper kick timing is not something I made up though.

Regardless of kick frequency (2,4,6 beat), in highly proficient swimmers, the finish of each arm pull (called the upsweep by some) is nearly always timed with a kicking downbeat by the same side leg. (i.e. left arm finish, left leg downbeat).

We refer to this as “Finish Kick Timing”. This timing is so ubiquitous in elite swimming, that it is regarded in Maglischo’s book as “seldom a problem” (Maglischo, revised edition, 2003) It is important to note that Maglischo’s work was overwhelmingly based on national caliber collegiate swimmers and above.

We consistently find that in non-elite and adult onset swimmers the** inability** to naturally produce this timing is as omnipresent as the* ability* in their elite counterparts.

Getting back to your video, you are not far off. Kicking a little early is all.** I suspect proper finish timing would have resulted in even faster swimming for you.** Never too late.

Faster than 1st amateur out of the water at IM Texas??? I bet if we see him swim at race sped, the timing is dead on. TJ is FOP AG swimmer. It’s more than just the timing, it’s the body roll timing, it’s the legs balancing and supporting the roll, it IS propulsion. There are numerous close variations to an “ideal” OWS stroke w/ not one being right for everyone. For TJ, w/ his stroke, kick, body morphology, etc that looked damn good.

30

Faster than 1st amateur out of the water at IM Texas??? I bet if we see him swim at race sped, the timing is dead on. TJ is FOP AG swimmer. It’s more than just the timing, it’s the body roll timing, it’s the legs balancing and supporting the roll, it IS propulsion. There are numerous close variations to an “ideal” OWS stroke w/ not one being right for everyone. For TJ, w/ his stroke, kick, body morphology, etc that looked damn good.

TJ looks good swimming and goes pretty fast. No arguments here. I would like to see if and how that timing changes at race speed, given that he is giving advice based on exactly the timing we see in the video. So while you are saying the timing changes (to what I am describing?) at faster speeds? While TJ claims that what we see is already correct?

And of course there are variations in many aspects of elite swimmers. Finding Freestyle wrote the book of “not one (style) being right for everyone”. We even made a chart…

Everyone is different
Body size Compostion (muscle, fat, density, flexibility)Proportions (torso-legs, hand size, feet size, head)Optimal kick frequency (2, 4, 6 beat or other)Opposition or full/partial catch-up (i.e. Float and Paddle versus Status of LIberty)
Everyone is similar
Arm frequency range of elite distance swimmers (1.3-1.6 sec/cycle)Near exclusive use of even kick frequency (2, 4 or 6 beat kick)Body connection - hips “drive” propulsion - even catch-up strokers have rotation synchronized to propulsive phase of stroke (if they are doing it right)Kick timing - “Finish-Kick” timing Breathing every 2-3 strokes in distance events

However, everything I said about kick timing stands. Proper finish kick timing is right for damn near everyone. It’s not like he is a multi-time world champion, Olympic medalist etc. First amateur swimmer at IMTX is great. How much faster would/could he be?
.

31

I didn’t mean to offend you, and that is a nice video. This point I keep repeating regarding proper kick timing is not something I made up though.

Regardless of kick frequency (2,4,6 beat), in highly proficient swimmers, the finish of each arm pull (called the upsweep by some) is nearly always timed with a kicking downbeat by the same side leg. (i.e. left arm finish, left leg downbeat).

We refer to the as a “Finish Kick Timing”. This timing is so ubiquitous in elite swimming, that it is regarded in Maglischo’s book as “seldom a problem” (Maglischo, revised edition, 2003) It is important to note that Maglischo’s work was overwhelmingly based on national caliber collegiate swimmers and above.

We consistently find that in non-elite and adult onset swimmers the inability to naturally produce this timing is as omnipresent as the* ability* in their elite counterparts.

Getting back to your video, you are not far off. Kicking a little early is all. I suspect proper finish timing would have resulted in even faster swimming for you. Never too late.

You didn’t offend at all. Your description is just misguided. If you wait until the finish of the stroke to kick you’ve already finished the rotation, so the kick serves little to no purpose. And if you’re doing a 6 beat kick, then you have to get 2 kicks on that side before you rotate and the stroke is already finished. That just doesn’t work. I don’t mean to come off snarky, but step back for a moment and think about what you are saying. The pull finishes, which means that shoulder is now up, the opposite hand/shoulder is fully extended and under the body, and then you kick? What would the purpose be? You’ve already rotated, and if we’re talking 2 beat then propulsion isn’t really much of the equation.
If you watch someone like Phelps when he’s doing a 6 beat, you’ll see the first kick (of 3) is at the onset of the pull and the 3rd is at the end (where you describe). But that 3rd kick is more for propulsion and less for rotation. That first kick is what drives rotation.

Look at Sun Yang, the guy us triathletes like to use as the poster-boy for distance swimming:

http://youtu.be/XvM3JYC--hM

look at the 5 second mark and the 29 second mark, and pretty much anytime after since it’s in slow motion. There is no kick as he finishes the pull. Only at the onset, or as I so eloquently called in my hillbilly English, the meat and potatoes of the pull.

Hackett is the same… (2:57 mark)
http://youtu.be/Ohfi79LD_WE

32

I suspect proper finish timing would have resulted in even faster swimming for you. Never too late.

This is a distraction from the discussion, just thought it was worth a watch.

Here is a video of perhaps the largest lead ever at an ITU event after the swim (guessing, but watch and see):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ3bWEwghDI

33

You didn’t offend at all. Your description is just misguided. If you wait until the finish of the stroke to kick you’ve already finished the rotation, so the kick serves little to no purpose. And if you’re doing a 6 beat kick, then you have to get 2 kicks on that side before you rotate and the stroke is already finished. That just doesn’t work. I don’t mean to come off snarky, but step back for a moment and think about what you are saying. The pull finishes, which means that shoulder is now up, the opposite hand/shoulder is fully extended and under the body, and then you kick? What would the purpose be? You’ve already rotated, and if we’re talking 2 beat then propulsion isn’t really much of the equation.
If you watch someone like Phelps when he’s doing a 6 beat, you’ll see the first kick (of 3) is at the onset of the pull and the 3rd is at the end (where you describe). But that 3rd kick is more for propulsion and less for rotation. That first kick is what drives rotation.

Look at Sun Yang, the guy us triathletes like to use as the poster-boy for distance swimming:

http://youtu.be/XvM3JYC--hM

look at the 5 second mark and the 29 second mark, and pretty much anytime after since it’s in slow motion. There is no kick as he finishes the pull. Only at the onset, or as I so eloquently called in my hillbilly English, the meat and potatoes of the pull.

Hackett is the same… (2:57 mark)
http://youtu.be/Ohfi79LD_WE

Sorry if my description left something to be desired. Rest assured the concept of finish kick timing is fundamental to the vast majority of elite swimmers. I am not going to get into the physics debate as to why this is, it just is.

Let me try it again, and this is pulled right from the description of finish timing on my website.

“Generally speaking, the most effective place to kick a single-beat is during the “finish” phase of the pull of the arm on the same side as the kicking leg. In other words, if you are kicking with your right leg, place the downbeat of the kick when the right arm is in the last half of the underwater portion of the stroke.”

So, no, not when the stroke is finished. That’s not what I am saying. Between the mid point and the finish is where the dominant kick occurs.

Funny you bring up Sun, as he is the reason I say, “vast majority” and “nearly all”. When he rose to prominence, I spent a lot of time looking at his kick timing. He definitely does some outlier type stuff. I don’t see Hackett doing anything different than I describe, and I have watched that particular video quite a bit.

34

I suspect proper finish timing would have resulted in even faster swimming for you. Never too late.

This is a distraction from the discussion, just thought it was worth a watch.

Here is a video of perhaps the largest lead ever at an ITU event after the swim (guessing, but watch and see):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ3bWEwghDI

He probably had better kick timing back then. ;>)

35

You didn’t offend at all. Your description is just misguided. If you wait until the finish of the stroke to kick you’ve already finished the rotation, so the kick serves little to no purpose. And if you’re doing a 6 beat kick, then you have to get 2 kicks on that side before you rotate and the stroke is already finished. That just doesn’t work. I don’t mean to come off snarky, but step back for a moment and think about what you are saying. The pull finishes, which means that shoulder is now up, the opposite hand/shoulder is fully extended and under the body, and then you kick? What would the purpose be? You’ve already rotated, and if we’re talking 2 beat then propulsion isn’t really much of the equation.
If you watch someone like Phelps when he’s doing a 6 beat, you’ll see the first kick (of 3) is at the onset of the pull and the 3rd is at the end (where you describe). But that 3rd kick is more for propulsion and less for rotation. That first kick is what drives rotation.

Look at Sun Yang, the guy us triathletes like to use as the poster-boy for distance swimming:

http://youtu.be/XvM3JYC--hM

look at the 5 second mark and the 29 second mark, and pretty much anytime after since it’s in slow motion. There is no kick as he finishes the pull. Only at the onset, or as I so eloquently called in my hillbilly English, the meat and potatoes of the pull.

Hackett is the same… (2:57 mark)
http://youtu.be/Ohfi79LD_WE

Sorry if my description left something to be desired. Rest assured the concept of finish kick timing is fundamental to the vast majority of elite swimmers. I am not going to get into the physics debate as to why this is, it just is.

Let me try it again, and this is pulled right from the description of finish timing on my website.

“Generally speaking, the most effective place to kick a single-beat is during the “finish” phase of the pull of the arm on the same side as the kicking leg. In other words, if you are kicking with your right leg, place the downbeat of the kick when the right arm is in the last half of the underwater portion of the stroke.”

So, no, not when the stroke is finished. That’s not what I am saying. Between the mid point and the finish is where the dominant kick occurs.

Funny you bring up Sun, as he is the reason I say, “vast majority” and “nearly all”. When he rose to prominence, I spent a lot of time looking at his kick timing. He definitely does some outlier type stuff. I don’t see Hackett doing anything different than I describe, and I have watched that particular video quite a bit.

Like I mentioned before, you can place the kick anywhere you like, but if you put the kick that late in the stroke you end up swimming flat …or you have a shoulder driven rotation and the legs are more for lift than rotation. Perfect example is Laure Manaudou

http://youtu.be/q6GmflekO_g

She has a higher arm turnover and kicks precisely where you explain it, but has little in the way of rotation. Swimming that flat also sets you up for shoulder issues…as Manaudou also proved.

So Yang, Hackett, and us other ‘outliers’ will just have to agree to disagree with your kick placement

36

It’s not my kick placement. But maybe we can call Ernie Maglischo and get him to consider another revision, because exactly what I am saying is in his latest book, Swimming Fastest.

In any event at least we can agree that where the kicks take place matters. Even this point is generally lost in swim/kick discussions, and I am truly happy to discuss it with you.

37

This video of Ziegler vs Manadou in the 800 at the '07 WC may be of some interest in this debate, as Ziegler also mainly uses the 2-beat kick but with a somewhat slower turnover rate than Manadou. Z also throws in the 6-beat kick out of the turns and, most significantly, on the last 50 meters she turns on that kick to win the race.

38

I suspect proper finish timing would have resulted in even faster swimming for you. Never too late.
This is a distraction from the discussion, just thought it was worth a watch.
Here is a video of perhaps the largest lead ever at an ITU event after the swim (guessing, but watch and see):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ3bWEwghDI

So, how much did TJ’s lead end up being??? It was not clear at all in the video.

39

I suspect proper finish timing would have resulted in even faster swimming for you. Never too late.
This is a distraction from the discussion, just thought it was worth a watch.
Here is a video of perhaps the largest lead ever at an ITU event after the swim (guessing, but watch and see):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ3bWEwghDI

So, how much did TJ’s lead end up being??? It was not clear at all in the video.

:28 to Hamish Carter and then a couple seconds back to basically a pack of 8. Results.

40

I suspect proper finish timing would have resulted in even faster swimming for you. Never too late.
This is a distraction from the discussion, just thought it was worth a watch.
Here is a video of perhaps the largest lead ever at an ITU event after the swim (guessing, but watch and see):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ3bWEwghDI

So, how much did TJ’s lead end up being??? It was not clear at all in the video.

:28 to Hamish Carter and then a couple seconds back to basically a pack of 8. Results.

Ah, I see now, thanks for the link!!!