Below is a one min video of various angles of my freestyle stroke....I'm a 50 old geezer :) who's looking for some constructive criticism. Greatly appreciate any input as to arm positions thru stroke, head, kick, etc....At present, I can only swim about 300 yards free continuously before getting winded. Not looking to be a competitive swimmer just more efficiency and endurance.
http://youtu.be/UNNkO3ZExp4
Thanks!!!
This video came to mind while watching your video - the thing I notice most is your lead arm dropping too soon. It does look like you've made some improvements since your first video :)
www.youtube.com/watch
VIDEO UPDATE: Been working on my left side breathing and bilateral breathing since my first video just about a month a go. Approx 3x's a week in the pool for 45 mins or so at a whack. As mentioned, I'm a bit of a geezer (just turned 54 a week ago). The first 6-7 seconds of video is just breathing on left side...slowly coming along...when I started on this side a month ago I couldn't go but 2-4 strokes without drinking half the pool/gagging/arms flailing, etc.. The remainder of the video is different angles of bilateral breathing. Coming along....but freestyle endurance still sucks (only about 200 yards at a time before getting winded). I'm 6"1" and right at 200lbs, and workout/lift several times a week in addition to swimming so not like I'm a couch potato..I wish my endurance was improving.....but its really not.
Anyway, please feel free to be super blunt and critique this new vid. I look forward to the comments!
www.youtube.com/watch
The good: your body and head position are fairly decent, and your kick is not getting in the way of your body line.
As others have mentioned, your biggest weakness is your arm pull. You really need to do drills that help you internalize the proper high elbow catch position.
I HIGHLY recommend the book Swim Speed Secrets. It focuses entirely creating a proper freestyle arm pull. It has a ton of wonderful analogies, illustrations, and drills that will help you develop proper pull form:
www.amazon.com/.../ref=sr_1_1
I came back to swimming after a 6 years away from the sport (ages 18-24) and thankfully read this book . After 3 months of minimal training and technique work I crushed my best times from age 18. Its hard to understate how important the arm pull is for freestyle propulsion, and I feel this book is the best resource available.
You have definitely made progress! The head bobbing had been eliminated and it's great to see that you've become more proficient with the bilateral breathing.
I would suggest focusing more on the single arm drill as opposed to the catchup drill. Single arm will allow you to focus on the early vertical forearm, the timing of the breath and the finish. One of the problems with catch up drill is that the "catch up" move can become a habit and transfer over to your fullstroke, which is not ideal.
One other thing to work on is your tendency to cross over. Make sure your hand is placed in front of the shoulder as opposed to the nose. You can try using a snorkel to be able to locate and correct your hand placement.
Good job and good luck!
Thanks so much for the comments.....I did download the Swim Speed Secrets book on my kindle today to try to gain some additional insight.
FWIW, I really don't care about speed. At my age (54) I'm more interested in efficiency and building my endurance.
I'm actually more interested in being just all around more comfortable in the (open) water to include being able to swim half a mile or more in open water (all strokes) as I've really gotten into paddle board surfing and fear being separated from my board (broken leash) or getting caught in a rip and having to navigate back to the beach....
