In recent years I have greatly improved my breathing technique, and last season became very comfortable swimming 1500 - 2000 meters at a time, breathing to the same side (left and right on alternate lengths) with no sense of being out of breath. But I felt in a bit of a stroke length and speed rut.
I have always found bilateral breathing a lot faster than breathing to one side, but I usually feel desperately out of breath after about two or three hundred meters.
So my experiment for this season has been to incorporate bilateral breathing into my long practice swims. To retrain my body, I quit same-side breathing altogether. I started by alternating 50m crawl lengths with 50m easy breathing backstroke lengths. On the first few swims, I was desperate for air before and after the flip turns, and gasped as I surfaced in backstroke.
But a few swims later, I was not feeling so bad after the turn, and stroked hard on the backstroke. By about 600m, bilateral breathing was feeling like the right and proper way to swim. Moving to the outside 25m lanes last Sunday, I swam three lengths of crawl for every one of backstroke. Due to a sprained ankle I was doing open turns, which gave me an extra breath, of course, and I felt no air desperation at all. I knew that flip turns would be more challenging.
Tuesday I swam a full 1500m of crawl and 500m of backstroke. I was able to manage flip turns with tentative pushoffs. I found that extra breathing just before the turn tended to mess up my flip timing, and I had to tuck a lot to make the rotation. For about the first half of the swim I stuck with bilateral breathing, but gave myself extra breaths before and after the turns. I even tried breathing on successive strokes, like Sun Yang, but I don't exhale fast enough to be ready for the next inhale. For a few lengths I tried breathing twice to the right and once to the left, and eventually settled into breathing twice to the right and twice to the left—which seemed to be enough air.
About three quarters of the way through I remembered to spread my fingers, though I forgot again in backstroke.
I say breath every 2. Switch sides every now and then if you must.
I agree; air is GOOD! :agree: I am a natural left side breather, but I breathe to the left on odd laps/lengths and right on even laps/lengths to stay balanced; crucial to prevent shoulder problems.
... I breathe to the left on odd laps/lengths and right on even laps/lengths to stay balanced; crucial to prevent shoulder problems.
Interesting you should mention this. Most people seem with shoulder issues seem to experience problems on their non-breathing side. At least that's my recollection from comments I've seen here. My shoulder issues have always been on my breathing side. Maybe I'm just weird, but I don't think that breathing only to one side guarantees you will have problems, or if you do that you will have problems on one side or the other.
I don't breathe at all well to my left side. When I do, if my right shoulder is bothering me, breathing to the left can provoke pain, unless I am very careful to rotate well to the right when not breathing right...
Long story short... I don't think bilateral breathing is a panacea. If it's not already ingrained into your technique, it might not even help...
Skip
Long story short... I don't think bilateral breathing is a panacea. If it's not already ingrained into your technique, it might not even help...
Skip
I totally agree. I get newer swimmers all the time insisting that I teach them bilateral. I tell them I am happy to do that but don't assume it will make you any better of a swimmer.
I get newer swimmers all the time insisting that I teach them bilateral. I tell them I am happy to do that but don't assume it will make you any better of a swimmer.
+1
I think there are two basic reasons that most great freestylers above 100M choose during a length to breathe on the same side, virtually every stroke cycle: oxygen and rhythm.
For the same reason that flyers are now breathing more often, the benefits of more air usually outweigh the inconvenience of briefly positioning your mouth above the water's surface.
As far as rhythm, it perhaps isn't pointed out enough that freestyle is the only competitive swimming stroke with a built-in longitudinal asymmetry, because of side-breathing. The question is whether to embrace the asymmetry, and even try to exploit it, or instead try to minimize the effects of the asymmetry, by emphasizing bilateral (aka switch-side) breathing.
You still see the latter strategy widely coached, often supposedly to avoid neck and shoulder problems. On that score, a proper logroll during breathing should avoid injury. Improper breathing on both sides might simply result in twice the number of physical problems.
The competitive problem with switch-side breathing is that it usually interrupts the stroke rhythm. Sometimes you can even see the loss of momentum in switching sides, as the stroke is flattened and stalls.
The best freestylers seem to actually exploit the asymmetry. Their non-breathing-side arm acts a little like a catchup stroke, with a big reach, grab and scoop during the breathing body roll, followed by the breathing arm making a more over-the-top piercing stab forward, burying the head slightly, with a greater glide moment as the non-breathing arm catches up. The largest flutter kick is usually concomitant with the dominant arm stabbing forward, to combine propulsions. There are a lot of variations on this embrace of side-breathing asymmetry, but the different mechanics between the two sides of most great freestylers is obvious.
Park Tae-Hwan is a good mechanic to study in this regard. He's a sub 6-footer who uses an unusually low stroke count, and an obvious asymmetry. He has a favorite side, which he will sometimes reverse during a given length to keep an eye on his competition. The repeated, regular above-water glances give a more accurate measure of relative pace than below-water glances, which can subtly push a swimmer off-center.
Bottom line IMO: for most of us, other than strict splash-and-dashers, freestyle breathing should occur on one side the entire length, breathing AOAP, while looking for ways to exploit and groove the asymmetric side-breathing rhythm.
Long story short... I don't think bilateral breathing is a panacea. If it's not already ingrained into your technique, it might not even help...
Skip
I don't bilateral breathe; I breathe to the same side every two strokes (every stroke cycle) and change breathing direction after each turn.* Although my coach thinks my stroke looks balanced, I just think I am better off using this breathing pattern to help prevent a possible problem.
At first, learning to breathe to the right was a challenge, but now it is just as easy- and fast- for me. I definitely prefer to swim this way, too.
*Exception: My first breath of a length is always to the left, then I switch sides and breathe the rest of the length to the right, on the even lengths. One of these days, I will teach myself to break that habit and learn to breathe to the right when I take that first breath of a length!
I don't bilateral breathe; I breathe to the same side every two strokes (every stroke cycle) and change breathing direction after each turn.
Just because you don't breathe every third, fifth, seventh or ninth stroke doesn't mean you aren't breathing bilaterally in my book. For me, the precise pattern doesn't matter. The fact that you can and do breathe to both the left and right makes you a bilateral breather in my book. :D
I only breathe to the right. I can breathe to the left, but just barely, and my stroke pretty much disintegrates if I keep it up. It doesn't matter what pattern I use. It's not about how much air I take in. In fact, I don't mind breathing every fourth stroke, as long as I'm breathing to the right. :D
Thanks to one and all for enabling my continued right side, non bilateral breathing! For a while, I was thinking this was a byproduct of getting older and lazier but now I know that it's just better!
In recent years I have greatly improved my breathing technique, and last season became very comfortable swimming 1500 - 2000 meters at a time, breathing to the same side (left and right on alternate lengths) with no sense of being out of breath. But I felt in a bit of a stroke length and speed rut.
I have always found bilateral breathing a lot faster than breathing to one side, but I usually feel desperately out of breath after about two or three hundred meters.
So my experiment for this season has been to incorporate bilateral breathing into my long practice swims. To retrain my body, I quit same-side breathing altogether. I started by alternating 50m crawl lengths with 50m easy breathing backstroke lengths. On the first few swims, I was desperate for air before and after the flip turns, and gasped as I surfaced in backstroke.
But a few swims later, I was not feeling so bad after the turn, and stroked hard on the backstroke. By about 600m, bilateral breathing was feeling like the right and proper way to swim. Moving to the outside 25m lanes last Sunday, I swam three lengths of crawl for every one of backstroke. Due to a sprained ankle I was doing open turns, which gave me an extra breath, of course, and I felt no air desperation at all. I knew that flip turns would be more challenging.
Tuesday I swam a full 1500m of crawl and 500m of backstroke. I was able to manage flip turns with tentative pushoffs. I found that extra breathing just before the turn tended to mess up my flip timing, and I had to tuck a lot to make the rotation. For about the first half of the swim I stuck with bilateral breathing, but gave myself extra breaths before and after the turns. I even tried breathing on successive strokes, like Sun Yang, but I don't exhale fast enough to be ready for the next inhale. For a few lengths I tried breathing twice to the right and once to the left, and eventually settled into breathing twice to the right and twice to the left—which seemed to be enough air.
About three quarters of the way through I remembered to spread my fingers, though I forgot again in backstroke.
AIR is vital to survival in life and on long swims. Bilateral breathing or "breathing every 3" decreases the number of breaths you take in your race and increases the time between breaths which could and should decrease your ability. Especially short course.
the number of breaths you take per length depends on how many strokes you take
I say breath every 2. Switch sides every now and then if you must.
How many strokes do you take per length?
