500 free improvement needed

Ok, so not the best angle, but the two things I see are: 1) You need to make your kick smaller and more controlled. That big amplitude kick is out of rhythm with your rotation and causing your lower body to slew back and forth a bit. Hence the left foot snap that puts you back in rhythm temporarily. 2) On the catch, you need to bend your arm in order to pull the hand straight back on the pull. As it is now, your first movement on the catch is to push your hand down, which gives momentum up instead of forward.

There is an odd left foot snap out to the left about every 4-6 kicks. I think that is what is part of what is causing you to shimmy. Looks like your upper body isn't moving in sync (rolling) with your lower body. They are sort of moving like two separate parts instead of as one continuous rolling motion. Pull looks good. No crossover, and no pulling way outside the body line. But your hip shimmy is definitely slowing you down in the water. Also have you considered kicking off walls? Even one dolphin kick is better than none. I always tried to preach "free speed" to my swimmers: - tight streamlines - kicking off walls - fast turns - fast starts three out of the four above don't require any sort of fitness, just practice and sticktoitiveness. I would even say the kicking off walls doesn't require too much fitness, just practice. The fitness comes in if you want to MAXIMIZE your kicking off the walls. EDIT: Cause Jeff is more of a sprinter than me and beat me to it. Agree about the catch. I missed that on the first two watches.

Someone had requested some video clips. I don't have a side view yet. taken during set of 10x100s on 1:50. Going about 1:16-1:17 1st is the full last 100. 2nd is shorter from the middle of set. Could not find a way to store this on USMS. Let me know if this works for anybody. My video player starts funny when I run them. 1drv.ms/.../s!ApJUMQl1sh_KhCesbAxJaKCiiYYj 1drv.ms/.../s!ApJUMQl1sh_KhCj5eSTeLoZ-hgmI There is an odd left foot snap out to the left about every 4-6 kicks. Thanks for input.

Great to see that you were able to get some GoPro videos of your stroke! Overall you're a good swimmer, and in order to make the improvements you wish to achieve, you need to work on fine-tuning the efficiency of your pull and your kick - working on the finer details of your stroke to increase speed and maximize the energy you are putting in. In terms of the upper body, as mentioned you could get more out of your pull by aiming for an earlier catch - more of an early vertical forearm. As you'll see in the screen shot below, you start out with a straight arm and only really start the catch at the midway point of your pull. Start the catch early, just after extending your arm. Here's a good drill to work on the early vertical forearm. www.youtube.com/watch You also have a slight tendency to cross over with the left arm at the beginning of the pull, as displayed in the screen shot. Make sure that your hand enters the water in front of the shoulder, not in front of the nose. lh3.googleusercontent.com/.../2019-03-31.gif You can also work on improving your kick - as others have noted, your left foot is too wide and too far outside of the body, especially when you extend your right arm (see screen shot). lh3.googleusercontent.com/.../2019-03-31.png Finally, your push off the wall can be improved - and over a 500 swim, you can take quite a bit of time off if you get more distance off the wall on the push before beginning the dolphin kick. Working on these issues - in addition to improving overall conditioning and speed - will help you get where you want to be in terms of 500 free improvements! Good luck!

(I love this thread. Just sayin'. I'm learning a lot. Thanks.)

So first results are in from MN state championship SCY meet. Two day meet. Day1: 50free, 100Br, 200free, 100IM, 1650free Day2: 200MRel (fly), 400FRel, 500free, 100back, 50Br, 200FRel 1650 at end of D1, 500 early D2. Honestly I hoped for more improvement, but I worked on changing the 'catch' quite a bit and worked too much last couple of weeks (70+ hours, short sleep) before meet too. Here are graphs of the 1st and 2nd 1650 and 500: 11917 50 free's: from mid 28's last time to mid 27's for all of them this time (sprinting is fun, never really did that much before) 100 free relay split: 1:03.19 200 free splits: 31.62, 36.62, 37.68, 35.23 (happy with these but hadn't swam this before) 500 free: 6:52.74 to 6:48.30 1650 free: 24:14.29 to 23:43:54 non-freestyle swims I was very happy with I'm a little disappointed because I had a great heat to try to go after a 6:30. There were 3 people right around 6:30 and I couldn't keep up with them. I did feel really short of breath again around 200 mark, just like first time. I did get a chance to swim on a couple of relays before the 500 that I needed to sprint in (swam 50 fly and 100 free). Can't really blame that. The 100 free I didn't think I swam wide open and got a 1:03.19 (30.59/32.6) so I was really looking forward to the 500. My coach more than once has told me to not watch everyone around me and swim MY race. I know what a 40 sec 50 feels like now. Got to listen to her like Paul W. told me. (tip of the cap to her: 7/7 first places, 6 state records, even with my bugging her about little things, like where to put my toes on backstroke start, all meet). This is the revised base AM practice I've used for the last month from your input: 500 swim wup 400 pull wup 300 kick 75% 6x50s S/P technique on :60 (stress the new catch, 12 strokes / length swim, 13 strokes / length pull, 3 dolphins off wall EVERY start/turn) 10x100s S on 1:50, 1:16-1:17s 4x50s S/P tech. on :60 (38-40 secs.) 10x50s S on :50, 35-38's 4x50s S/P tech. on :60 (38-40 secs.) 6x100 IMs swim on 1:15(error) 2:15 8x25s no breathers (fly/free/underwater) PM practices starting last week: M/W: 1650 moderate, work technique, turns. 10x50s on :60 (:40s), technique, not speed T/R/F: walk two miles, lift shoulders / back / chest then Torres stomach routine (at meet talked to a hall of fame swimmer in MN that is 70 and went a 22:09.95! 1650 free, really believes in some weight lifting) I will put up video with the NEW catch in a day or two. I'm not faster with it yet, but it does seem like less energy and has reduced the strokes / length when I concentrate on it. Still feels awkward, kind of like I'm slipping. Thanks again.

haven't updated in some time, but I have the meet this Saturday again. First time since the meet 10 months ago. other than about 6 weeks this fall, I've been pretty consistent 4-5 days / week. I haven't swam with the masters team since spring ended, but will again starting after this meet. goal for the 500 is 6:30: 1:15,1:20, 1:20, 1:20, 1:15 Basic workout most days now is the following: 1x1650, first 500 easy, 2nd 500 medium, 3rd 500 pretty hard (no specific speed, just a perceived effort level. There is a lady that is a former college distance swimmer that swims next lane now, and I try to stay even first 500, gain a little each 50 in the middle 500, and pass at least twice in the last 650) 1x500 kick 1x500 pull (work the EVF technique, 75%+ effort) main 4x150 S/P on 2:30, hold pace at

took some video today. I really don't think I've changed much. Disappointing, need more technique work and video. Maybe left arm EVF is a little better, doesn't seem to drop right away. right arm not much better. Left foot flick is still there. back half still low in the water. link to video: link fixed (date time on video not accurate)1drv.ms/.../s!AJJUMQl1sh_KhD0

haven't updated in some time, but I have the meet this Saturday again. First time since the meet 10 months ago. other than about 6 weeks this fall, I've been pretty consistent 4-5 days / week. I haven't swam with the masters team since spring ended, but will again starting after this meet. goal for the 500 is 6:30: 1:15,1:20, 1:20, 1:20, 1:15 Basic workout most days now is the following: 1x1650, first 500 easy, 2nd 500 medium, 3rd 500 pretty hard (no specific speed, just a perceived effort level. There is a lady that is a former college distance swimmer that swims next lane now, and I try to stay even first 500, gain a little each 50 in the middle 500, and pass at least twice in the last 650) 1x500 kick 1x500 pull (work the EVF technique, 75%+ effort) main 4x150 S/P on 2:30, hold pace at 'd have a few comments: You're spending way too much of your workout doing basically non-pace swimming through that 2,650 warmup. A workout needs to be very intentional and easy swimming should be limited to - gentle (but not overly long) warmup, some drills, cool-down (again not overly long) I've had a fair amount of success in the 500 over the years and, on a percentage basis, my typical workout would typical have about 20% easy - the first few hundred, cool-downs 25% moderate / build - the actual warming up part where most of my sets are descending to pretty face 55% race pace work I find many swimmers and many masters programs spend way too much time swimming slow. If you want to swim faster in a race, you've got to train faster in a workout.

To me this suggests you might want to drop your pace. If you want to swim a 6:00 500 then definitely shoot for :36 on these. This is correct...except that holding :36 per 50 is actually :36 and a fraction. If you see :36 change to :37 as you hit the wall, that will be a :36.8 or so, if you see :36 stay for a moment, that is what I call a :36 solid which is maybe a :36.4 or so. Either way, if you add up 10 repeat 50s that are :36.4, that is a 6:04 500! What really needs to happen is to repeat 50s holding :35 so that when you add the fractions you will get to 5:59.99!!! Which is infinetly better than 6:00.