Hello, I'm a UK swimmer (41) who took up swimming following a running injury 4 years ago. A familiar scenario to many. My freestyle and breaststroke is OK and infact I do fairly well in a breaststroke set at the club.
My butterfly is like a stone in the water however. I have chatted to other members , the coach, and watched the good guys, but it does not seem to happen. I get no real leg power on a kick in, kick out rhythym for each arm pull. I know the power comes from the stomach as well as the legs and I know rhythym is important. Has anybody had any great moments of enlightenment. No amount of drill work seems to make a huge difference. Any ideas ?
Parents
Former Member
Cynthia,
On my high school team we used to play it for a change of pace in our training program. That was real animal ball. Then in law school I joined the water polo club. Since Ann Arbor is one of the very few areas outside of CA that has varsity high school water polo (or at least they did in the 80's; who knows now), those guys were the real backbone of the team, and they used us duffers to fill in as bench scrubs.
Even at that time, the 2 or 3 women who wanted to play had to play with us guys. Same/same for some of the other teams we played. (I had my own gentleman's code of conduct about which dirty tricks I would not use if I was guarding a woman, or vice versa.) Now, of course women's water polo is a varsity sport at U of M, and I might add with alumni pride that they are currently the top ranked women's team in the country outside of CA or HI.
Times change, in some ways worse, in some ways better.
Matt
Cynthia,
On my high school team we used to play it for a change of pace in our training program. That was real animal ball. Then in law school I joined the water polo club. Since Ann Arbor is one of the very few areas outside of CA that has varsity high school water polo (or at least they did in the 80's; who knows now), those guys were the real backbone of the team, and they used us duffers to fill in as bench scrubs.
Even at that time, the 2 or 3 women who wanted to play had to play with us guys. Same/same for some of the other teams we played. (I had my own gentleman's code of conduct about which dirty tricks I would not use if I was guarding a woman, or vice versa.) Now, of course women's water polo is a varsity sport at U of M, and I might add with alumni pride that they are currently the top ranked women's team in the country outside of CA or HI.
Times change, in some ways worse, in some ways better.
Matt
