I'm sure many of you are already aware of this article on about.com It reviews a couple of studies that try to explain why swimmers tend to have more body fat than other athletes.
Thought if you weren't aware of the article you might find it interesting.
swimming.about.com/.../offsite.htm
Lainey
Parents
Former Member
Maglischo's book Swimming Fastest charts the acceleration/deceleration that occurs throughout each of the swim strokes. Breaststroke and fly both have significant speedup/slowdown phases. That explains why these strokes are more tiring to swim fast. You have to use enormous amounts of energy to accelerate your body after each slowdown cycle. Even a world class breaststroke is jerky compared to a typical crawl.
The point is that extra body weight will make acceleration more difficult and tiring. This should be most significant to ***/fly swimmers but the basic goal is to have more power and less mass.
The flotation provided by less dense bodies is the offset I suppose. My own guess is that this factor is negligible in short races but more significant in distance and open water swimming. I also think a "small" body will have less surface area to cause drag in the water. Better to be a jet ski than a cabin cruiser.
These are all theoritical issues and can be completely overcome with better fitness and technique. We all know very good swimmers who do not have the slim/strong/lean build. But they are strong, have great technique, and great fitness.
Maglischo's book Swimming Fastest charts the acceleration/deceleration that occurs throughout each of the swim strokes. Breaststroke and fly both have significant speedup/slowdown phases. That explains why these strokes are more tiring to swim fast. You have to use enormous amounts of energy to accelerate your body after each slowdown cycle. Even a world class breaststroke is jerky compared to a typical crawl.
The point is that extra body weight will make acceleration more difficult and tiring. This should be most significant to ***/fly swimmers but the basic goal is to have more power and less mass.
The flotation provided by less dense bodies is the offset I suppose. My own guess is that this factor is negligible in short races but more significant in distance and open water swimming. I also think a "small" body will have less surface area to cause drag in the water. Better to be a jet ski than a cabin cruiser.
These are all theoritical issues and can be completely overcome with better fitness and technique. We all know very good swimmers who do not have the slim/strong/lean build. But they are strong, have great technique, and great fitness.
