I just started doing this this week and have already felt an improvement in my stroke. So I was just curious to know if anyone else breathes to the side on fly?
If you do, do you keep your head to the side, or do you flip back and forth between front and side? What advatages to you notice to side breathing as compared to front? How to you make adjustments for the arm you can't see?
If you don't, have you ever considered trying it? What advantages to you see in breathing to the front as compared to the side?
Just thought it would be interesting to find out about different peoples swimming styles.
Parents
Former Member
Originally posted by craiglll@yahoo.com
His comments are on p 167-168.
1) The range of motion of the neck is very limitted. therefore, the side-breathers must lift their heads further out of the water than forward breathers. The next paragraph he says that might be okay.
2) Side-breathers rotate their body to the side they are breathing on.
When I watch side-breathers, I notice that they tend to break the flow of their stroke for an extremely limited time. It is enough to cause drag though. They all tend to recover their arms & hands unevenly. It seems to me that they are beeaking some of the forward motion they have created.
That rotation seems to be very dependent on their side breathing skills. Some people do have a tendency to tweak their whole body, others have learned not to. This side-tweaking I've seen mainly with beginners who are yet to get little more skilled in the finer points of keeping your body balancd and coordinated while swimming.
Another thing that I noticed that for people who tend to have slightly forward rounded shoulders, they have to lift their head out of the water less to side breathe. Seems like it's mainky because their rounded posture makes it for a longer way out of the water to forward breathe. It's not just the matter of lifting your head out of the water, but you have to straighten your back and shoulders during the stroke phase where it's more natural for them to be moving down and forward. For someone with more rounded shoulders, this (lifting up) is not onky the longer path of travel, but it takes mroe efforts, not just moving your head bit extra work for your arms and shoulders.
If your shoulders aren't naturally rounded forward, then it may be shorter and easier to just tilt your head up a bit to get air, since it's most likely already closer to the surface when compared to someone with rounded shouders.
Those are just things I've observed happening in the clinics we teach, where I have been noticing that people with more forward rounded shoulders gave easier time breathing on the side.
I think like a lot of little things in swimming, it boils down to one's body style.
Originally posted by craiglll@yahoo.com
His comments are on p 167-168.
1) The range of motion of the neck is very limitted. therefore, the side-breathers must lift their heads further out of the water than forward breathers. The next paragraph he says that might be okay.
2) Side-breathers rotate their body to the side they are breathing on.
When I watch side-breathers, I notice that they tend to break the flow of their stroke for an extremely limited time. It is enough to cause drag though. They all tend to recover their arms & hands unevenly. It seems to me that they are beeaking some of the forward motion they have created.
That rotation seems to be very dependent on their side breathing skills. Some people do have a tendency to tweak their whole body, others have learned not to. This side-tweaking I've seen mainly with beginners who are yet to get little more skilled in the finer points of keeping your body balancd and coordinated while swimming.
Another thing that I noticed that for people who tend to have slightly forward rounded shoulders, they have to lift their head out of the water less to side breathe. Seems like it's mainky because their rounded posture makes it for a longer way out of the water to forward breathe. It's not just the matter of lifting your head out of the water, but you have to straighten your back and shoulders during the stroke phase where it's more natural for them to be moving down and forward. For someone with more rounded shoulders, this (lifting up) is not onky the longer path of travel, but it takes mroe efforts, not just moving your head bit extra work for your arms and shoulders.
If your shoulders aren't naturally rounded forward, then it may be shorter and easier to just tilt your head up a bit to get air, since it's most likely already closer to the surface when compared to someone with rounded shouders.
Those are just things I've observed happening in the clinics we teach, where I have been noticing that people with more forward rounded shoulders gave easier time breathing on the side.
I think like a lot of little things in swimming, it boils down to one's body style.
