Hi all,
I'm looking for advice on training for the butterfly. In the way of background I'm 40, male, and started swimming with a Masters swim group last summer and have been learning butterfly. I was only a fitness swimmer before last summer, and only off and on. I did a 50m fly in 35.97 last November but haven't gone below 36s since. I've swum the 100 fly four times and have done 1:31.5 +/- 0.5s each time. I would like to work up to the 200m fly but am not sure how to go about it, unlike the other strokes I can't go further simply by going slower! At this point 100m is pretty much my limit, and I only do 100m in meets not as part of workout sets. I found an article on the H2ouston site on training for 200m fly, which brings up another issue: short axis pulsing/body dolphining. First, I'm not very good at it, I spent an hour on the weekend swimming back and forth across the width of the pool (6 lanes, not sure the distance), and I can do a width of the pool underwater but I'm pretty slow. Second, I don't really understand the relationship between body dolphins with one kick per cycle and butterfly with two kicks per cycle. The H2ouston article said there would be a separate article explaining this but I couldn't find it. I've got the total immersion butterfly/*** stroke video, but so far my butterfly is nowhere near "virtually effortless" as they describe in the video. I think I have the timing of the two kicks down ok, but I'm missing the connection between the body dolphins and the full stroke, other than initiating the launch kick of the full stroke in my upper body rather than just using my legs. I also worry that body dolphins involve a larger undulation than is desirable in the full stroke. I've seen a video of me swimming fly and it looks like it is in slow motion! My impression is that I might need less undulation in order to increase turnover?
I am also unsure of what extent one has to swim fly to train for fly, we don't get a lot of fly, and really nothing over 50m of fly in our workouts, and if I tried to do 100m fly in the "choice" sets I would probably have a coronary! My current hypothesis is that technique is a greater obstacle to getting to the 200m fly than conditioning so all my freestyle training is going to have minimal impact. I just have to figure that those of you talking about doing 1650 of fly or 10 x 200m fly sets must be doing something different, I can't imagine that conditioning alone would allow me to keep up my stoke for 10 x 200m! But is there some particular aspect of technique one should adjust for longer distances?
Help!
Every saturday is my day to train for the 200 fly. Gives me a nice break from all the distance freestyle stuff.
1. You say you got the total immersion *** and fly video but you don't mention that you have actually practiced the drill progression they give. If I work through them at the beginning of the workout I can swim something that looks like fly, otherwise it is somethign resembling a dying animal. So try the drills in order and see what they are teaching. I often have to review them because I forget one of the keys to the drill.
But they all make sense.
2. Short axis pulse is fly undulation with one of the kicks taken out. Specifically the breakout kick, the kick that you take when you dive back into the water is the one that stays the same. Right now I am just working on one beat fly, I'll add the second beat when my form holds for more reasonable distances.
3. You mention swimming widths of body dolphin underwater. I had a breakthrough when i was able to get a breath while doing the body dolphin without breaking the undulations. It mostly involves keeping your head neutral and not looking forward to breathe. In fact, that was probably one of the biggest things. Doing lots of body dolphin with arms out and working on getting the breath as part of the rhythm.
4. All the drills have a good purpose. The body dolphins I mentioned, the stoneskipper helps nail the hand plant at the corners. Hip delay taches a clean recovery.
Good luck
Not to say that this is the only way to learn it, but I have had some success with it. I am swimming 200 fly repeats regularly (I know it's not the same as the 200 fly) and have been making good progress.
Every saturday is my day to train for the 200 fly. Gives me a nice break from all the distance freestyle stuff.
1. You say you got the total immersion *** and fly video but you don't mention that you have actually practiced the drill progression they give. If I work through them at the beginning of the workout I can swim something that looks like fly, otherwise it is somethign resembling a dying animal. So try the drills in order and see what they are teaching. I often have to review them because I forget one of the keys to the drill.
But they all make sense.
2. Short axis pulse is fly undulation with one of the kicks taken out. Specifically the breakout kick, the kick that you take when you dive back into the water is the one that stays the same. Right now I am just working on one beat fly, I'll add the second beat when my form holds for more reasonable distances.
3. You mention swimming widths of body dolphin underwater. I had a breakthrough when i was able to get a breath while doing the body dolphin without breaking the undulations. It mostly involves keeping your head neutral and not looking forward to breathe. In fact, that was probably one of the biggest things. Doing lots of body dolphin with arms out and working on getting the breath as part of the rhythm.
4. All the drills have a good purpose. The body dolphins I mentioned, the stoneskipper helps nail the hand plant at the corners. Hip delay taches a clean recovery.
Good luck
Not to say that this is the only way to learn it, but I have had some success with it. I am swimming 200 fly repeats regularly (I know it's not the same as the 200 fly) and have been making good progress.
