Stroke Rate

I have to agree with the previous two posters in that 20 seems way too high. I think most of the intermediate to advanced swimmers (male and female) on our team take 12-15 strokes per lap. All that extra arm churning you are doing will wear you out and slow you down ultimately. Guvnah - I noted the same thing this summer on my 50 meter days. Was a little discouraging to do 12 strokes on a 25 yard day and 37 on a 50 meter day but it sure reinforces the concept of taking long smooth strokes.

Thank you guys for the advice I am certainly sure I can do less than 20 strokes if I push off the wall. I will try this week. Also during the recent Olimpics, I counted how many strokes pro swimmers did on the 50 meter pools, and to my surprise on one of the 200 freestyle races the wimming girl made 46 strokes on the last 50 meter lap. Isn't it too high for a pro? I also noticed that if I go faster, I do more strokes than if I take it a bit more easy. Why do 100 meter sprinters do more strokes per lap than 400-meter swimmers? I don't kow your times on 100 meters, but I just checked a website, see the following links: swimming.about.com/.../dpsandrate.htm swimming.about.com/.../dpsandrate_2.htm It says: "Stan Swimmer completes the 100 meter freestyle in 1:00, using 54 stroke cycles (108 strokes). That would be approximately 23 strokes on 25 yards (27 on 35 meters) which according to you is too high. However this guy is really fast for an average swimmer. My time on the 100 meters is certainly more than 1 minute however I seem to do less strokes than him!!! What are your times and number of strokes on 100 meter freestyle race in a 50 meter pool? Also check this interesting link: www.goswim.tv/.../cadence.html

Originally posted by aquageek I have to agree with the previous two posters in that 20 seems way too high. I think most of the intermediate to advanced swimmers (male and female) on our team take 12-15 strokes per lap. All that extra arm churning you are doing will wear you out and slow you down ultimately. Guvnah - I noted the same thing this summer on my 50 meter days. Was a little discouraging to do 12 strokes on a 25 yard day and 37 on a 50 meter day but it sure reinforces the concept of taking long smooth strokes. Is this competition speed or moderate practice speed?

At your height, you should be well under 20. Always push off of the wall. Also do you start with a kick or a stroke? You should work on starting with a kick. Also, make sure that at least 10% of your workout is kicking either with a board or in a streamline position. Go to Swimm200.com (? it might be org). They have really good workouts for many different ranges. Also on this sitre, nate's workouts are very good. they might be too advanced for you but you can modify them for your distances.

Sopas -- Push off the wall, man! I'm 6'6", so my experience won't be directly comparable. With my best push off the wall and best stroke form, I'll usually do 10-12 strokes (or 5-6 cycles.) With average push I'll usually do 12-15. (Most often 14.) (Note: 25 YARD pool.) You will have to figure out how to extrapolate that to your experience without a push (unless you "re-calibrate" yourself by counting strokes WITH a push.) Here's something that might be interesting and helpful. A few weeks ago I had an opportunity to swim in a 50 METER pool. When I swim in a 25 meter pool I usually find myself doing about 2 more strokes per length (sometimes only 1 more) than in 25 yards because of the longer distance. So we might think that doubling the 25 meter count would give me my 50 meter count. Hardly! What happens is that in a 50 meter pool I now have to swim through the distance I would have covered on my turn and push in the 25m pool for every other length. (Hope that made sense.) So where I would usually do perhaps 16 strokes per 25 meters, I was doing more like 37-38 strokes per 50 meters. This tells me that my turns (AND PUSH) save me 5-6 strokes or so. So I'll repeat my first words of advice to you: Push off the wall, man! :) :)

Originally posted by spintwo Is this competition speed or moderate practice speed? Moderate pace. --- Sopas -- I think you are over-thinking and over-analyzing this. Swimmers take far more strokes at racing speed to attain max speed. But that's why a swimmer expends all his energy in 50 or 100 yards as opposed to being able to swim a 1500m race. You're probably not doing that sort of racing speed in your workouts. I haven't taken the time to find it, but I'll bet that you'll see that Gary Hall took far more strokes on his one length 50M race than Michael Phelps did in his first length (or even his last length) of his 200m race. And yes, even a 1500m swimmer will take more strokes on the last length than on any other as he kicks to the finish -- especially if he's eyeball-to-eyeball with his competition!

In Swim-(last issue) there was a great article about straoght arm recovery & stroke rate & speeding up kicking. Rates have to be low or you waste a lot of energy moving your arm during recovery. If you are taking more than 17 strokes/25yds too many!!!!!! You probably are not moving your hands through the water very efficiently. rEMEBER SHOULDERS UP ARM SHAPED LIKE A BOOMERRANG. Try to get some advice & have someone watch your stroke. Make it cleaner & your rate will automatically drop.