Please let me know if this forum isn't for this kind of question.
I am trying to learn to swim properly. I have been very comfortable with water all my life, no problems at all. However, the only stroke I have ever swum is the *** stroke and probably not so well. Still, I have crossed small lakes swimming and feel completely at ease in any body of water.
Now I am trying to learn proper freestyle. No coach at this point. Lots of videos on the 'net and I also ordered the TI videos.
One problem I am having is that my body doesn't seem to stay near the surface of the water. Because of this, when I rotate to breathe the air isn't there...so I have to either over rotate or wait for the bobbing cycle to bring me back to the surface. I am not sure why this is happening and I am hoping that this is a simple newbie mistake and someone can point out how to correct it.
I am swimming with my head down, even pushing it down chin-to-chest. I am also doing skating drills on both sides and breathing without any problems during those. It's when I transition to crawl that I seem to descend just a few inches. I imagine if I was watching from the outside I'd see me kind of bobbing up and down as I move through the pool.
Any ideas or pointers in the right direction would be appreciated.
Thanks,
-Martin
Parents
Former Member
You would probably benefit a lot from a series of group or individually coached sessions. You can do a lot on your own, but at some point you HAVE to get someone with the right experience to work with you.
It sounds like you are moving in the right direction. I'd encourage you to keep visiting this forum. Not everything will be of interest to you, but there are a lot of remarkably skilled (and nice) folks here who frequently have discussions that you will likely benefit from.
To get the correct body position for easy breathing in front crawl is too much to cover in one post, or even one thread probably. But this is usually how I introduce the idea...
Can you float on your back with your toes out of the water?
The lesson is on "center of buoyancy". You want to try it with arms in opposite positions... over your head, and at your sides.
For all strokes a goal should be a flat body position in the water. This helps improve streamlining, which in turn makes everything else easier (like breathing). :-D
If you want some additional articles to look over try these sources:
www.h2oustonswims.org/articles_by_category.htmlhttp://www.svl.ch/index.html
:)
Reply
Former Member
You would probably benefit a lot from a series of group or individually coached sessions. You can do a lot on your own, but at some point you HAVE to get someone with the right experience to work with you.
It sounds like you are moving in the right direction. I'd encourage you to keep visiting this forum. Not everything will be of interest to you, but there are a lot of remarkably skilled (and nice) folks here who frequently have discussions that you will likely benefit from.
To get the correct body position for easy breathing in front crawl is too much to cover in one post, or even one thread probably. But this is usually how I introduce the idea...
Can you float on your back with your toes out of the water?
The lesson is on "center of buoyancy". You want to try it with arms in opposite positions... over your head, and at your sides.
For all strokes a goal should be a flat body position in the water. This helps improve streamlining, which in turn makes everything else easier (like breathing). :-D
If you want some additional articles to look over try these sources:
www.h2oustonswims.org/articles_by_category.htmlhttp://www.svl.ch/index.html
:)
