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!
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Former Member
I don't think I am as far along as you in learning the fly, but I do have a similar feeling. So far, I don't ever swim more than one length at a time - otherwise I get sloppy and I don't want to let that become a habit. Usually, I swim 25 fly then either 25 free or 75 free - something like that.
My timing on the kicks/strokes is terrible. In my case, what I have learned is that it starts on the push off/first stroke. I push off and glide. Then as I start to slow down, I begin to kick to get the most out of the push off before stroking. The first stroke has to be timed right or I am in big trouble. If the timing of the first stroke is right, I can finish the length with relative ease. If the timing is off - in my case I think I begin the stroke a split second too late - forget it. It becomes almost impossible to recover my arms. I am between kicks when trying to recover/breathe so I don't get that push out of the water. My arms end up recovering partly under the water instead of over and I have to lift my head to breathe instead of keeping it in line with my back. If I get a first stroke like this, I just stop doing the fly and immediately go into freestyle stroke rather than try to get the timing fixed for that length.
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Former Member
I don't think I am as far along as you in learning the fly, but I do have a similar feeling. So far, I don't ever swim more than one length at a time - otherwise I get sloppy and I don't want to let that become a habit. Usually, I swim 25 fly then either 25 free or 75 free - something like that.
My timing on the kicks/strokes is terrible. In my case, what I have learned is that it starts on the push off/first stroke. I push off and glide. Then as I start to slow down, I begin to kick to get the most out of the push off before stroking. The first stroke has to be timed right or I am in big trouble. If the timing of the first stroke is right, I can finish the length with relative ease. If the timing is off - in my case I think I begin the stroke a split second too late - forget it. It becomes almost impossible to recover my arms. I am between kicks when trying to recover/breathe so I don't get that push out of the water. My arms end up recovering partly under the water instead of over and I have to lift my head to breathe instead of keeping it in line with my back. If I get a first stroke like this, I just stop doing the fly and immediately go into freestyle stroke rather than try to get the timing fixed for that length.
