Approach to teaching competitive swimming?

I thought I had at some some understanding of front quadrant swimming but what is front quandrant swimming in butterfly?

Thanks to Phil and Wayne for a more exacting discussion on the actual angles of front quadrant swimming. I can see that the positioning may not be as overhead as I thought, but I still think the issues of freestyle technique leading to shoulder injuries should be looked into by people more qualified than us, like physiologists or orthopaedics. And Wayne, this is certainly not to cause trouble but a word of caution. In your post you take a very authoritarian stance, a "my way or no way" connotation, and then sign your post "ACSA Level 5". Well that's great. Back in the 60's, the highest rated coaches were teaching methods that *at the time* were thought to be the best. ASCA level means nothing to me, it doesn't mean one can't explore new ideas and perhaps learn from others. It doesn't mean one knows everything there is to know about swimming. Taking that attitude may turn people off to listening to anything you have to say. I've reviewed the NCAA tape over and over and still fail to see the 50 and 100 freestylers employing the front quadrant technique. To me, there appears to be no hesitation, no "wait" time before the pull as the trailing arm recovers. Phil: Agree with you on rotation. How come TI repeatedly says the kick is not terribly important but we've seen some TI posters now indicate that the "world-class swimmers" generate their rotation from the kick. I'm sensing conflicting information. I thought the rotation was supposed to be generated by the core muscles. To me, it also appears to come from the nature of freestyle in itself, the way the arms and shoulders are used. Backstroke: agree with the poster (it may have been Phil also) that the pinky down happens because you've rotated onto your side, not because you actually turned your pinky down. An aside... same with the catch. Your arms should enter no closer to your center line than your shoulders because once you are rotated onto the side, the catch happens directly above you on the center line. More shoulder-friendly too. Regards, RM

It may be a mistake to dive into the pro/con TI discussion, but I think some of the anti-TI reasoning is off base. (I didn't say all... :) ) 1) They look at the 100 Free, then the 50 Free, and say "stroke length gets shorter, TI is wrong". That is the wrong comparison. If you look back at one of Emmett's early posts, he points out that within a given race distance (in his example, the 50 Free), there is a strong correlation between stoke length and speed. 2) People are pointing out irregularities in Olympic swimmers, and saying that it does not fit into TI. But they do not address the question, "Are they faster because of the stroke quirk, or in spite of it?" (Or is it cosmetic, in which case you shouldn't have brought it up. :) ) 3) Make sure you are comparing apples to apples, instead of oranges. You have a group of All-American Division I swimmers versus some small community college, it won't matter WHAT technique the JCs use, the playing field is not even. Given two swimmers with the same phyical ability, the question is whether TI gives an advantage over an alternative method. Don't use a freak-of-nature talent who doesn't use TI as an example, unless they tried TI and went slower. Just to show that I have not been brainwashed, TI is completely wrong when they say to swim like fish. Fish have tails that go side to side. I've never seen *anyone* kick like that. We need to swim like dolphins; our hips can move the same way as their tails. ;)

Mattson makes several good points. Since I was the one that discussed stroke 'quirks' of the best swimmers, and he said 2) People are pointing out irregularities in Olympic swimmers, and saying that it does not fit into TI. But they do not address the question, "Are they faster because of the stroke quirk, or in spite of it?" (Or is it cosmetic, in which case you shouldn't have brought it up. ) I just want to make it clear that that is *exactly* the question I was asking - is their good swimming because of their style, or despite of it, and what does TI have to contribute to the discussion? I *never* said it does not fit into TI (but I did say it 'appears' to violate the naive picture I have of TI principles - that is a request for elucidation from the more experienced TI proponents.) If it is cosmetic, I would like to know that, since I don't know it now. Once that question is answered, the more interesting questions of how to recognize those swimmers that should be encouraged to swim with these different styles, how to coach it, etc. can be addressed. If I thought I could answer these questions, rather than just ask them, I would be a professional coach. I am disappointed that my questions have not been addressed in some way by those more knowledgeable than me. I would have assumed that the 'quirky' styles of Hoogenbrand and Bennett would have been analyzed to death. I can only assume that the answers are not known, or even claimed to be known. And if they are not, the field of swimming science has a long way to go. Oh, and I think it should be 'swim like a sea otter.' They at least have legs. Or a seal, which has split fins. And have you seen the butterfly kicks the elite swimmers (at least Misty Hymen) do off the wall? definitely sideways.

I disagree with: Originally posted by mattson ... Don't use a freak-of-nature talent who doesn't use TI as an example, unless they tried TI and went slower. ... Total Immersion (TI) writes in page 47: "FQS (i.e.: Front Quadrant Swimming) swimming means always keeping one or the other of your hands in that quadrant." and "Leaving each in place just a split-second extra can make a big difference in your Froude number.". (i.e.: Froude numbers are vessel numbers analogous to swimmers who swim 'taller' by keeping one hand in front that "...split-second extra..."). Keeping one hand that "...slpit-second extra...", means a pause after the arm entry into the water, during the catch of the water. This pause makes for a lower arm turnover rate. Velocity is length multiplied by rate. The question is: if rate lowers due to the pause, is length more than compensating it, so that velocity increases? My input in this thread, the example of Anthony Ervin in this thread, hundreds of swimmers reported in this thread, Bill White and others' input in the thread 'TI advice: stroke length vs rate', say: no. These inputs are already posted by now. They can be read and re-read. I reinforce my existing input with: August 15 in Cleveland, I swam 800 meter free, a lifetime second slowest, faster than only one single instance when I swam it in the year 2000 on painkillers for my back. Two fast-twitch observers, Ian Smith and Jim Thornton said to me afterwards that I have too much TI in me, and that a faster turnover rate is recommended. In general, I found the book Total Immersion to be written with a marketing behavior in it, as in superficial sales pitches. This is opposed to more profound data from another book which also attempts to explain swimming, but better. The sections discrediting cross training benefits of kicking with a board, pulling with paddles, dry land training -for example on an inclined bench-, are naive. In conclusion: this thread has plenty of "...tried TI and went slower.", and another thread -'TI advice: stroke length vs rate' by Bill White-, is 100% of "...tried TI and went slower."

Hi Phil Arcuni - I was talking about kicking in terms of the motion, not the body position in the water. I am assuming that Misty Hymen is on her side, but still kicking towards the front and back (like a dolphin), and not towards the shoulders (like a fish would, if they had shoulders). :) If RainMan is still out there, I have three opinions: 1) You mentioned that many of the ideas are well established with age-group coaches. Might you be putting the cart ahead of the horse? At the time the ideas that led to TI came out, they were radical and not established. 2) There is a huge difference between SPL in practice, and in meet situations. pg 103: "By (Popov) training his body to get by on those 28 (SPL), the 34 he allows himself on race day... are a piece of cake." 3) There are a lot of books out there, besides TI. If you are interested in swimming history and the evolution of the techniques, I would look for the books by Cecil Colwin.

Originally posted by Phil Arcuni ... I would have assumed that the 'quirky' styles of Hoogenbrand and Bennett would have been analyzed to death. I can only assume that the answers are not known, or even claimed to be known. And if they are not, the field of swimming science has a long way to go. ... I believe that their swimming styles are found in many swimmers, but the difference is not understood: 47.84 swam in the year 2000, and 47.86 swam in the year 2002 by Pieter van den Hoogenband (Ned) in 100 meter free, is simply not explained so far by better known technique (for example by Total Immersion -"The Revolutionary Way to Swim Better, Faster, and Easier" like Terry Laughlin writes proudly in order to 'justify' swimmers who are fast but slower than van den Hoogenband-, the success goes far beyond this booklet), and is not explained by better theory of conditioning so far. In interviews, when van den Hoogenband swims slower than his potential, like he did in the 2001 World Championships, he emphasizes his need for getting back in shape through conditioning, he doesn't mention technique. It's like if he feels that his technique stays ingrained by practicing his usual drills in workouts. Likewise applying fish dynamics to humans, is not clear. The future will uncover more...

That's true that community college swimmers against a division 1 team would not have a chance, no matter what techique they use. I was wondering is Misty Hyman turns allowed in masters swimming.

Originally posted by mattson I disagree with almost everything Ion has said. :rolleyes: First off, you mentioned pg 47, where the book talks about keeping the hand in front longer. YOU used the word "pause", which I think it wrong. The hand is in front doing two things: active streamlining (while the other arm is pulling), and "catching" the water (to get a powerful stroke). If all you are doing is letting your hand hang in front, no wonder you did not see any improvement. ... Mark, keep doing "...:rolleyes...", toward the book: in page 48, it says "Enter, e-x-t-e-n-d, pause and pull.", doesn't it? 'pause' means: pause. Thus a slower rate. "...active stramlining..." and "..."catching" the water (to get a powerful stroke)..." during the pause, are undefined by you but talked about. Popov doing 28 strokes in workout, so 34 in race is misinformed: Popov races what he is training at, which is 31 strokes; he also trains with lots of 'Explosive Speed Training' bursts at more than 31 strokes prorated to 15 meters sprints, with more than 100% of the energy of a 50 meters sprint. His coach, Touretski, makes him doing these repeats of dive and 15 meters sprints, with a work to rest ratio of 1 to 4. 'Explosive Speed Training' is not practiced in USMS workouts. Originally posted by mattson ... The goal is not to minimize SR, it is to keep a long SL as you pick up your SR. ... That's why the thread 'TI advice: length vs rate' has posts (by Paul for example) recommending to swim at race speed in workouts at least once per week, unlike the TI book advising to train mainly slow and cute. Originally posted by mattson ... pg 30: "As you begin to approach the upper limits of how quickly you can move your arms, you can usually speed them up even more only by decreasing your stroke length... Increase one and decrease the other by the same amount and your product - velocity - doesn't budge." pg 33: "First, you have to learn how to position your body so it moves as far as it possibly can with each stroke (SL); then you have to get fit enough to take those strokes at a high rate (SR)... They always make their most dramatic improvements when they give up a bit of their SR in order to gain a lot of SL." Reducing your SR is *NOT* the same as TI. Laughlin states this quite clearly on pg. 107: "It's possible to get too carried away with this business of eliminating strokes when you're down to such a triumphantly tiny number of strokes that you're taking forever to get to the other end." ... The problem I have with TI is that it emphasizes an elusive increase in stroke length: "Tell me which part of the swimming-speed equation you'd rather work on...", is asked in page 33. In page 33, it also states: "SR is training-oriented. You have to work hard to build up your muscles and energy system..", which I agree with, but is missing from the book. Another book I have, deals with technique, five types of training, cross training, nutrition, taper and race tips. That's better, more complete. Originally posted by mattson ... You talked about the hundreds of people in this thread; I doubt that there are even twenty people posting in this thread, ... No, I talked about how training is reported in this thread to apply to hundreds of swimmers. I have in mind age-group kids, coached by age-group coaches as reported in this thread. I communicated well this. Originally posted by mattson ... and the views have been varied. You have failed to address pg 31. Studies from the 1984 US Olympic Swimming Trials and the 1988 Olympics: "Over and over, what they found was that long event or short, the fastest swimmers took the fewest strokes." ... That's not the case of Anthony Ervin. That's not the case of the people in the thread 'TI advice: length vs rate', like Bill White. That's not my case when I swam faster than in 2002. Originally posted by mattson ... In fact, the world's top researchers estimate that champion swimmers owe about 70 percent of their great performance to perfect stroke mechanics and only around 30 percent to their fitness..." ... It's an unfounded claim. "You have to work hard to build up your muscles..." as mentioned in page 33 of the TI book, requires more than 30% for maintenance and development, since it is volatile if one doesn't train it. van den Hoogenband in my post above emphasizes this in 2001 World Championships, and many others emphasize it too. It is also my experience. Originally posted by mattson ... You also state that TI discredits kicking with a board, pulling with paddles, and dryland training. For kicking with a board, yeah he doesn't like them. But are boards *necessary* to get a good (or better) kicking workout? On pg 197, he suggests using fins instead of boards for the kicking sets. (Myself, I like boards, because they stretch out my lats.) On pg 199, Laughlin seems fine with paddles: "... you can get a fine (aerobic workout) wearing buoys and paddles." "...Add paddles to your hands and a tube around your ankles to the buoy between your legs. That will both increase the resistance and add some muscle to your pull." (versus using a pull buoy alone) He also seems to support dryland training. The only caveat was on pg 220. "(In the early stages of a swimming-strength-training program that you may be starting, use) your own body for resistance - bodyweight exercises." pg 222 "Eventually, of course, your muscles will need more than bodyweight to continue growing stronger... begin mixing in... free weights or machines in equal amounts." ... Kicking with a board is wide spread, over fins. Popov is doing it, I saw Jenny Thompson doing it every day I saw her workouts when I was with Stanford Masters, Bennett is reportedly doing it, Thorpe, Hackett are doing it, and so on. I put a tube around my ankles when pulling, that's no breaking ground information regarding pulling with ankles tied. On the dryland training, TI says in page 201: "Swim Benches", "My advice is, save your money.". Another book on swimming, by a faster swimmer than TI's author Laughlin, claims: "A. Swim 200 yards freestyle at 85 percent to 95 percent effort. B. Count the strokes on the last lap (e.g., 15). C. Divide total workout time by the number of laps you swam (2:20 x 8 = about 17 seconds). D. You should set the machine (i.e. the Swim Bench) for a comparable load. In this example, you would set the load so that you could do approximately 15 strokes in 17 seconds.". I choose to value the contradictory opinion on Swim Bench, and on many other dry land exercises like Bench Press and Rowing, by the more accomplished swimmer than Terry Laughlin is, over the TI's opinion. Originally posted by mattson ... But from the tone of some of your messages, it sounds like you have a vendetta against Laughlin. If you reread Emmett's messages, his concern is that people take a single idea from TI (such as reducing SR during inital practices), misapply it, and think that the entire TI program is garbage. From the misinterpretations and misinformation that you have posted, it would seem that you fall into this category. I don't think "...the entire TI program is garbage...", but I wrote that I think it is a marketing ploy, with pompous claims like "The Revolutionary Way...". I wrote this clearly.

Hey Phil, your sound a little like Cecil Colwin: "Should a swimmer use long, slow strokes or short, fast strokes? Actually, skilled swimmers tend to use long, fast strokes." - Swimming in the 21st Century I'm not sure who started the discussion about Olympic lopsided swims, but in the same Colwin book, he points out that (at the time) there were no swimming studies involving arm dominance. He also points out the difference between rolling slightly more towards the stronger arm to get constant propulsion (which he supports), versus a lopsided gait (which is less efficient than a balanced stroke). Howdy Rain Man! I'm sorry that I have allowed myself to argue so strongly for something that, while very interesting, is not the end all and be all of swimming. Like I said, I just don't like to see something slammed for the *wrong* reasons. First off, keep in mind the two questions that led to TI: 1) What are elite swimmers doing that regular swimmers aren't? 2) Which of those differences could be taught to the less skilled swimmer? So it is a little dangerous to compare Olympic medal swimmers as an example, because they have already approached the limit of their SL. (Fractional differences could be from starting time, height, etc., rather than stroke technique.) You can contrast them to less skilled swimmers. I also think that some people are taking the "a little bit is good, so a lot must be better" approach to SL, underwater glide time, etc. When I looked through the book again, any extremes were only so (new) swimmers can notice the difference in the feeling (compared to previous habits). This is also true for SR. The method is to reduce SR so you can concentrate on good SL, then to crank the SR back up. Seems like some people are stopping at step 1. :D When I think to what prevailing theory was back in the late '80s, there is a whopping huge difference now. :) I don't know how much TI caused this, but it did seem to be one of the standard bearers. You mentioned Ervin (and later, his underwater glide). I was looking at the study of the 100 free 2000 Olympic Trials from USA swimming web site, and his SL and stroke frequency were no different from anyone else's in the finals. Why does his name keep popping up in this thread? At the Olympics, his stroke frequency for the 50 was 1.0/second (about the same as Hall). A study by Ron Johnson (1982) found "For a good college male sprinter a typical tempo is around .95 seconds (per cycle)..." So by 1982 standards, Ervin is not turning over enough! :) If you are interested in the time for underwater glide, try to find to find the University of Buffalo study for breastrokers. Good reading! (For contrast, at the next swim practice, look around to see how many people are popping to the surface, after a turn, while they are still above swimming speed.) Elsewhere, you asked about FQS. The idea is not to pause the front arm during the recovery of the other arm! (Catch-up and almost-catch-up are drills, not race strokes.) The idea is that during the most propulsive phase of the pull, the other arm should be in front to reduce the extra drag. There is still a slight overlap in the two arms pulling, and since the arm recovers faster that the other arm pulling, your arms spend more time in the "front quadrant" than the "rear quadrant". Also, despite what was misquoted elsewhere, the front arm is not (just) pausing, but "catching" the water before the pull. On pg 62 of TI: "Jerk your hand back immediately after plunging it in and you've started an exercise in futility as it slips water from one end of the stroke to the other. Bald tires on an icy road. Instead, slip your hand in, anchor it to get ready for the pull, and keep your grip as you move your arm down and back using robust body-roll muscles, not weak shoulder muscles." In the "perfect swims" analysis of the Olympic 50 Free, this was brought up about both Hall's and Ervin's stroke. Looking on the web, I found a summary of Toussaint's thesis on "Mechanics and Energetics of Swimming". He compared 6 competitive swimmers compared to 5 triathletes, both groups "at equal rates (900 W) of energy expenditure. The groups did not differ in mechanical efficiency, stroke frequency, and work per stroke. There was a difference in distance per stroke (1.28 m vs 0.99 m), and mean swimming velocity (1.11 m/s vs 0.90 m/s)." The swimmers were spending less energy moving water backwards, which meant more energy was available to overcome drag. Also found the race analysis system for The 9th FINA World Swimming Championships FUKUOKA 2001. I took the men's 100 Free, and made two groups: the eight finalists versus the 16 semi-finalists. As a group, the eight finalists had longer stroke length AND shorter stroke frequency than the semifinalists. Next, I divided them into three groups: six in A (under 49 sec), seven in B (between 49.0 - 49.5), and ten in C (between 49.5 - 50.0). Group B had the lowest stroke frequency, C the highest, so SR is muddled. However, for stroke length A had the longest, while C had the shortest, so SL has a strong correlation with speed. I'll end with quotes from Colwin's book, which I have recommended before: "Researchers report no consistent pattern with regard to stroke frequency during a swimming race... Researchers agree, however, that stroke length rather than stroke frequency is the determining factor in a swimmer's average speed... Male swimmers attain greater speed than female swimmers because they swim with a greater stroke length. However, the two sexes have very similar stroke frequencies." "Based on a season of observation of the four racing strokes in the 200 yard events, the study showed, except for backstroke, a marked correlation between average speed and stroke length. The study found no significant correlations between average speed and stroke frequency. ...the study needs to be replicated. The early indication, however, was that swimmers should concentrate on increasing their stroke length while maintaining a constant stroke frequency."