Swimming Efficiently A week or two ago I popped up an article on running efficiency. That dealt mainly with turnover, ground contact and how to generate speed. Efficiency in the water is actually much more important due to the much higher density (resistance) water creates as you try to move thru it. If you’re inefficient you’ll spend a lot of energy for the speed you go. That’s energy you actually want to save for the bike and even more so the run where the resistance to you moving is much less. I want to drop some thoughts on you here on how to increase your swim efficiency. That’s not necessarily the same as swimming faster though. Speed doing anything to me is all about efficiency. For a given energy output, if you’re more efficient you’ll go (relatively) faster. So what are we trying to do in the water…. To swim faster you need to do two things. Increase your arm resistance (in the right direction) and decrease your body resistance. Repeatedly over the years I see these two basic components of more efficient swimming working against each other in most people’s swim strokes. First of all, I want you to change the way you think about what you’re actually doing in the water. When you think of the swim stroke you’re likely thinking about swimming your arms under your body. If you feel yourself doing this (which you will) then you’ll think you’re doing everything right. Even if you do it wrong your arms are likely still moving under your body so you think all is good, yet still can’t figure out why you can’t swim faster. Instead I want you to think about swimming your body over your arm (specifically launching from one side of your roll to the other moving down the length of the pool). There’s a difference and when you focus on it you’ll feel yourself moving through the water better and going farther with each stroke. Now you can start to focus on the things that will work towards your actual goal. Everything I talk about below will be to help you do this better. I’ll give you some ideas on drills to overcome efficiency killers and tools you can use in the swim to make this easier/more effective. On You Tube check out the swimmer Alexandre Popov (type in Popov Swimming Technique) and you’ll find some great videos. Here’s the link that works now… https://youtube/watch?v=i0yBnGHw624 I love watching great swimmers in the water so if you have clips pop them into the comments section to help others. Balance Balance is critical in the water and most people aren’t even aware that they don’t have it. Without it you’re going to have a very hard time applying any real power to your stroke. All those weird arm and leg actions you do are a result of you trying to get into balance, and unfortunately they kill your efficiency in the water. First though let’s make sure you don’t have a physical inability to get into the proper positions. If you can stand on land out of the water and mimic the proper swim motions (see below) but just can’t seem to repeat them in the water, then chances are you’ve got balance issues. You may have other issues too but let’s stick to swimming here. Here are two drills you can do to get better balance. I apologize in advance. They ARE going to piss you off when you do them, and yes you can hate me all you want for now. You’ll thank me later… Balance Drill – Stick a pull buoy between your KNEES. You’re not going to kick with either of these drills so the pull buoy is there to keep your legs up near the surface of the water. Lay on your right side in the water with your left hand along the left side of your body, hand on your left hip. Stretch your right arm down the length of the pool and lay it out there as though you were about to take a stroke. You’ll likely want to breath so either use a snorkel (see below) or take a breath as you need to but put your face back in the water face down and pointing at an angle forward to the bottom of the pool. Using a snorkel will help you get this faster. The goal is to get to the point where you just lay there on your side, motionless, without moving your legs around or sculling your hands/arms. If you’re in great balance you’ll just lay there motionless. If you have issues with balance you’ll be moving like crazy and likely rolling onto your back and stomach. You may want to let the lifeguard know youre doing this as seeing someone laying motionless in the water face down tends to freak them out for some reason. However, if youre looking for a way to have that cute lifeguard come and save you then dont say anything and see what happens. Super Slow Swimming Drill – The progression of the balance drill is to swim VERY slowly down the length of the pool. Keep the pull buoys between your knees (you’re not going to kick in this drill either). Swim extremely slowly down the pool rolling from one side to the other. Very slowly move your arms; It should take about 6 to 8 seconds to get your hand from the front of the stroke (entry) to the back of the stroke (exit). It’s painfully slow and gives you a LOT of time to find out where your imbalances are. The faster you move your arms the easier it is to cover up those issues. You WANT to find those areas of imbalance and work on eliminating them. Again, youll be rolling onto your back or stomach a lot and it looks like you dont know what youre doing. Be strong and try not to think about what everyone thinks about you and how sorry they feel for your family etc. Good luck and don’t curse me too much. Entry and Catch For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction (Newton’s Third Law of Physics or something like that) so be very aware of what you’re doing as you enter your arm into the water. This is also why the balance drills are so important. All those wild flailings you used to do before the drills to get into balance where killer for efficiency. Of course you have to get your arm forward in the water to get a catch down the pool to pull yourself up to, but don’t put too much wasted energy into getting your arm too far forward. Cut into the water leading with your fingertips. Slide your hand then your arm and shoulder into the water following the fingertips. A lot of swimmers reach too high and too far forward for their strength/flexibility. They then end up putting too much energy into pressing down with their hands and forearms to get into the catch position instead of getting into that catch position at the end of their reach and immediately pulling back. The resulting downward press from that high catch position does very little to pull their body forward through the water (wasted energy) and actually increases their body resistance in the water by tipping the front end of the body (shoulders and head) upward (resulting form the downward press of the hands and arms into the water to establish the catch position) which also causes the legs to drop deeper into the water (poor efficiency thru increasing body resistance in the water). I’m not saying don’t reach forward, just don’t reach any farther forward than you are capable of in order to get into an effective catch position. As you adapt you’ll be able to reach higher and farther and still get that good high catch. But start low first and work your way up. Your limit will be determined by how flexible or strong you are as indicated by your ability to get your hand down below your elbow prior to initiating the pull action. Having a more vertical forearm allows you to expose more surface area to the water (in the direction you want – backward) and will increase your arm resistance in the right direction. Too many people begin the pull action with their whole arm (hand, forearm and upper arm) before the hand/forearm has established itself vertically below the elbow. Correct this by delaying the pull of the bicep/upper arm till your hand and forearm is under your elbow and then swim your body over your bicep (notice how I didn’t say swim your bicep back under your body). Imagine you have a tube entering the water above your shoulder and going into the water at a 45 degree angle forward into the pool. Recover your hand and enter it and your arm into that tube. This is so important I want to say it YET AGAIN…. Another way to think about it is to reach forward and down to get into the hand catch position and then drive your forearm forward so that it finds itself above your hand. Instead of thinking about swimming your arm UNDER your body as you swim, actually FEEL yourself pulling your body OVER your arm as you swim. It will look like the exact same thing but the difference is huge. Don’t break your wrist as you begin your pull. You want to maintain a consistent paddle/angle from your forearm through to your hand. If you break your wrist to get your hand facing back without doing the same with you’re forearm then you will decrease the surface area you are exposing to the water as you pull back. A great tool/swim I like to use here is the Forearm Fulcrum by Finis (see below). It gives you immediate feedback if you break your wrist angle. Pull The hands should pull from beneath the body in a motion parallel to the surface of the water (ie pulling backwards, not down or up), but in a position perpendicular to the surface (hand and forearm vertical, not at an angle to the surface of the water). Pressing down or up will cause your body to bob in the water and increase body resistance. Although your hands travel beneath your body they should (especially at the front end of the stroke), in relation to your body, be adjacent to your torso (not in front of your chest). This rolling in the water is to allow you to engage the stronger back muscles during your swim stroke and to bring your hips into the swim stroke. Too many people stay fairly flat in the water and pull with their arm in front of their chest which forces them to use the weaker chest and arm muscles to swim. By rotating from side to side it makes it so much easier to anchor your hand and arm in the water and then launch yourself forward thru the water by rotating forward from one side of the stroke to the other. A big thing a lot of people do wrong is snake their hands excessively through the water trying to swim their hands in an S curve. Don’t do that purposefully. Your hip rotation will do that naturally and at the right time. If you try to snake your hand through the water you may end up knifing your hand in too soon in the stroke and that sucks energy from your stroke (you lose traction in the water). Instead keep your elbow angle constant through the pull and don’t allow your hand to “insweep” until your hand has passed under your shoulder and gets closer to your hip. The timing of this varies so play around with it. Once you establish your elbow angle during the catch phase work hard to maintain this angle throughout the pull motion. Bending your elbow to allow the hand to come in towards the chest during the pull sucks energy out of the stroke. Don’t forget to finish off your stroke by pushing down to below your hip, extending your arm backwards. Not so far though that you have to contort your body to get it back farther). Accelerate your hands through the water thinking that at the beginning of the stroke at entry and the start of the catch your hands are moving approximately 2-3 feet per second. At the end of the stroke they should have accelerated to 12-14 feet per second. Most of this acceleration happens farther down the swim stroke closer to your stomach/hips. Accelerating too early just breaks your hand from sticking in the water properly. Think of a powerful car on a wet pavement. Hit the gas too quickly and the wheels just spin and don’t go anywhere. Gradually accelerate though and you establish initial traction so that applying more power doesn’t result in slipping. Recovery The timing of the recovery in relation to the pull should be closer to that of a kayak action than a catch up. I think the catch up stroke (where you leave the hand in the water in place stretched out in front of you while your recovering hand “catches up” before you pull with the under water hand) promotes a slower and weaker turnover/application of power. The kayak stroke on the other hand (characterized by the hands being mainly opposite each other throughout the stroke) allows the swimmer to: -maintain better speed (less accelerating and decelerating), -establish a faster turnover and -utilize the hips to pull the stroke using the larger back muscles. I know a lot of people love the TI method of swimming and although I think it teaches great streamlining in the water I don’t think it’s good for swimming fast. However, (pure) swimmers can get away with a catch-up form of swimming because they have such powerful kicks. I remember swim training in a pool in Australia years ago with Simon Whitfield and Greg Bennett as I was prepping for IM New Zealand. Those two can kick faster than my normal swim speed. Impressive. A kick like that can maintain momentum to overcome the inherent dead spot/deceleration in a catch-up form of swimming. For the rest of us with less than optimal kicks and or who are saving our legs for the bike and run (my preference) then the kayak principle form of swimming will give you a more consistent application of energy, and less deceleration in parts of your stroke. Kick As long as you kick efficiently and don’t waste your legs in the swim then kicking with a 2 or 4 beat kick is a matter of personal preference. I prefer the 2 beat kick as it is easier to use your kick to increase your arm turnover without tiring yourself out too much. The 2 beat kick is characterized by having your (for example) left foot kick down into the water every time your right hand enters the water. Your foot actually kicks slightly after your hand actually enters the water. But there is a pronounced downward kick with the leg opposite the hand that is entering the water. If I use a 4 beat kick I find my arm turnover actually decreases and I find it hard to increase my arm speed without becoming very fatigued. Not good when you are preparing to ride your bike in a triathlon. Stroke Rate vs Stroke Length A great way to determine if your stroke is getting more efficient is to count the number of strokes it takes you to get down the length of the pool. A lot of people start up around 20-23+ strokes to get 25m. As you get more proficient in the water you’ll find that drop down to the high teens (16-18 strokes per length). I know when I’m swimming well as I’ll cruise thru the pool in usually 13 strokes per length. Once you are able to establish an efficient stroke (Stroke Length) then your next goal (after a few month of lower stroke rate work) is to increase your Stroke Rate. The faster you can turn your arms over while still maintaining your stroke length, the faster you will go. Our goal is to keep that low stroke rate per distance but increase the rate in relation to time – that’s where the speed will come in. Swimming Aids If you dont like buying things then dont read this section. I just always have people ask me what I recommend so will put what I use and why here.... In the past I’ve had some great discussions with Tim Elson, one of the top swim coaches in the US (Pepperdine University Swim Coach) and a big name behind the Finis Swim products line. I met Tim for the first time in Hawaii as I was getting ready to race Kona one year. At the time I was in the Kona pool prepping for the race and he had me try some of their products. Specifically the Snorkel, Tempo Trainer and the Freestyler Hand Paddles. I think both the paddles and the fins are great to use for swim training but I specifically want to talk here about the snorkel and tempo trainer. Snorkel finisinc/eq…/technical-products/snorkels.html I love this snorkel. It actually fits out the front of your face and up over the top of your head - unlike a regular snorkel which comes off the side. With the snorkel out front between your eyes you have a great sight line for what your head is doing. You know immediately when your head starts to snake through the water and tilt excessively - both big killers of swim efficiency as it creates so much hydrodynamic drag. Im always telling people during swim sessions that their breathing should fit into your swim stroke, not have your swim stroke fit into your breathing. If your breathing doesn’t fit naturally into your stroke then Immediately take the breathing movement out of the equation and learn to swim properly first, THEN learn to fit the breathing pattern into your swim stroke. If you have biomechanical limitations go see a sports doc/chiro/ therapist etc to work on the range of motion and strength needed to get into those positions. By taking the breathing temporarily out of the stroke you can focus on what you need to do to get more efficient and smoother in the water – creating a balanced efficient swim motion. The snorkel allows you to relax in the water, get into a good consistent rhythm and not have the breathing damage your stroke. You might think that this would detract from your ability to breath effectively once the snorkel comes out. On the contrary, Ive found that once you get a grooved swim stroke without the breathing affecting things, then when you go to breath you are more likely to keep that solid swim stroke and have the breathing just happen naturally. Of course you can practice the breathing motion with the snorkel still in and move more and more to that motion till one day you just take out the snorkel and you’re good. Tempo Trainer finisinc/…/electroni…/tempo-trainer-pro.html… I really really like this little device. The Tempo Trainer is a small, electronic unit that attaches to the swim cap or goggle strap, and transmits an audible beep to develop consistency of stroke rate. You can actually use it for so much more than swimming (running cadence, timers for fuelling while training/racing, a reminder to talk to your spouse or kids about something other than your last or next race etc) but Ill stick to the uses for swimming in this note. There are two modes. In the first mode a single beep is emitted as quickly as once every 0.2 seconds (5 times a second) up to once every 9.9 seconds. After it reaches 10 seconds the trainer emits a triple chirp once every interval, up to once every 9minutes 59 seconds. Tim was recently working with another swim coach who coaches some of the fastest swimmers in the US and what they were working on was stroke rate drills. This is a typical exercise with the Tempo Trainer. Set the beep to go off every time you want to take a stroke. When Im swimming Ill do this to make sure Im not going too fast so I can focus on technique. Once you have the efficiency of your stroke dialed in then you can ramp up the tempo of the beeps and swim with a faster stroke rate to consistently increase your speed. What Tim was most excited about though was the Virtual Training Partner ability of the Mode 2 portion of the Tempo Trainer. By setting the triple chirp interval of the Tempo Trainer you could make sure that you hit the wall on a consistent interval. For example, say you wanted to maintain an average of 1:28 per hundred (or 88seconds per hundred) you could set the Trainer to triple chirp every 22 seconds. That way every time you hit the wall (4 times for 100m) the unit chirps and youll know immediately if youre on pace or falling behind, rather than having to wait till the end of the interval to see that you missed your pace time, that is if you can see the pace clock (I remember wrkts where I consistently saw double and triple after finishing some sets). This would be ideal for a rest interval too as you could hit the wall every 22 seconds and after the last length get another 22 seconds of rest interval before heading off on the next swim interval. Of course you would need 2 Tempo Trainers if you wanted to have one going to pace your strokes and one going to pace your lengths. I LOVE this for open water swimming. Ill just set the interval beep and set off, trying to keep a good consistent stroke rate till I get to where Im going. Great feedback to stop from getting sloppy in the water. If you had two Tempo Trainers going with one set for 10 minutes you could swim till you heard the triple chirp then stop for a bit of a rest/stretch and then get going again. Forearm Fulcrum finisinc/forearm-fulcrum.html The Forearm Fulcrum looks like an eternity loop that fits over your hand and forearm. As you swim it encourages you to keep your hand and forearm aligned as one unit, stopping you from breaking your hand at the wrist. It forces you to keep your arm in that position otherwise it falls off. Works amazingly well and is great to use until you develop the habit to keep that position during the catch and pull. On the Finis website they have some words form Peter Reid. Peter Reid, the first athlete FINIS sponsored, won the 2003 Ironman Triathlon World Championship on October 18 with a swim time of 00:50:36, and finishing time of 8:22:36. In interviews immediately following the race, Peter commented I had the best swim of my life. At the FINIS Swim Clinic in Kona during the week prior to the race, Mr. Reid said, I never make a workout without my Tempo Trainer. Its awesome for pool swims. Its awesome for open water swims. Ordering You can find Finis products in stores so look around but if you like shopping on-line go to finisinc . I talked to Tim and asked him for a discount code I could give people and if you use bentley you’ll score a 20% discount. Good luck with your swimming and again, I apologize for any mental discomfort the above will cause in the short term. Steven Bentley
Posted on: Tue, 16 Dec 2014 16:56:01 +0000