Breaststroke has always been my favourite stroke, but I've had these questions/problems for the longest times, could someone answer them for me? By the way, I'm 15.
1) How in the WORLD is it possible to do that ankle snap thing? I've been trying to turn my ankle out and in but it just wouldn't budge. It's just stuck there, and it cannot move side to side. I've seen some pictures of breaststrokers' feet turning 90 degrees in, but how can I do that? What are some exercises to improve side-to-side ankle flexibility?
2) I have a pretty narrow kick, and I think it is decent. However, I never feel the "explosion" everyone's talking about. I try my hardest to kick hardest, accelerating, but my legs just feel like pasta at the end of each kick. I can get pretty far with my kicks, but I feel like I can do better - I sometimes don't feel a lot of water resistance against my feet.
3) I've been having a bit of trouble with slipping recently. When I'm doing a 50 or 100m *** at a faster pace, my hands will sometimes fail to grab water, and sometimes a foot, sometimes both feet! I think it has to do with my pulling too fast, but I dunno.
4) When I go into a wall during ***, I am usually not tired, not even in a sprint (Short Course). However, the minute I complete my turn and start my underwater pull out, all hell breaks lose. I feel like my lungs will explode, and right after my first breath every single muscle begins hurting like never before. All fatigue comes at this one turn, and worsens every turn, until the last turn my underwater pullout is much shorter than my first pullout (from pushoff, I can usually do 10 meters from the pushoff while still maintaining a decent speed).
5) What are some workouts I can do to improve my sprint 50m and 100m breaststroke (short course)? I think I can do a near 40s 41s for 50m short course breaststroke from pushoff, but I want to get close to and under 35s.
6) What are some dry-land exercises I can do to improve my breaststroke?
7) Any other advice for faster sprint breaststroke?
Thanks A BUNCH to everyone who replies. I am really frustrated right now. Thanks again.
Former Member
Thanks a lot for your reply.
What do you mean by sitting on my ankle while toes pointed out? I can rotate my ankles, to some degrees, in, but I can't rotate them out. So you're suggesting that I force my ankles outwards and sit on them for 20 seconds at a time right?
Should I be feeling anything during this? Pain?
The thing is, I can't see how this is done. I see how your ankles can be turned in, but to turn outwards? It's all bony there...
Would you mind elaborating how to sit on my ankles? I've done the ones to train up and down ankle flexibility, like those needed in flutter kick, but I've never done the ankle flexibility trainings for turning my feet out.
Any other activities to train my ankle flexibility?
Thanks.
1) If you can't turn your ankles out, you're in trouble with breaststroke. That's the key to the kick. I'd say do some dryland involving sitting on your ankles with your feet pointed out. Do it for about 20 seconds at a time. But you might not be physically inclined to do it, which will make swimming *** harder.
2) The ankle flexibility is a large part of this.
3) Make sure your arms are low enough in the water to keep from grabbing so much air!
4) Do some underwater swimming. Train your lungs to hold your breath longer. You can do this on any stroke. You can do a set of 25s going as far as you can without passing out. Keep doing this over a course of four to five weeks and you'll find yourself going further.
5) I like swimming breaststroke underwater. With all the drag it forces your arms to be more powerful.
6) Again, sitting on your ankles. You're only 15, so I would not suggest going into the weight room yet.
7) Watch videos of some great breaststrokers. Watch them in slow motion. Don't try to swim just like them, but borrow some things that might suit your body.
It's not just ankle flexibility. Hip flexibility is key to being able to turn out your ankles. Play around with an eggbeater kick, that might help you get the feel and begin working your muscles the right way. When I was a kid, I dropped a ton of time off my 100 *** after the summer where I held a 10 lb. weight over my head while doing eggbeater for increasingly long intervals every day. I went from a 1:15 to a 1:06 in three months (100 SCY).
(I know, slow, but still an improvement lo these many years ago).
Hip flexibility is indeed a major part of a good breaststroke kick. Apologies for not mentioning that. You can do the eggbeater kick in the water to help, but I like sitting on my ankles. I'll try to explain it:
Start out by placing your ankles together on the floor and legs together, too. At this point, imagine your body at a 90 degree angle, with the bend happening at your knees. Then, lower your butt to your ankles, so that you're sitting on them.
Now, to simulate the breaststroke kick position, turn your feet out from under you with one hand and feel your hip joint move to turn the ENTIRE LEG around the hip joint. What you're doing is turning all the bones below your hip joint around so your ankles can rotate better.
Geez. It's much better to show you. If you can, ask a breaststroker you know to show you how. He or she will no doubt know what I'm referring to.
And yes, your lung capacity is a big reason why you're tired after a breaststroke pullout. It takes so much energy to do the pull, that the oxygen leaves your lungs quickly and is replaced by carbon dioxide. It's a lot harder than simply kicking underwater.
Thanks for your reply.
I've just checked with my coach, and the winner of last year's provincial qualifying swim meet for 50m *** SC was 31s!! That was 2 seconds faster than the winner of the provincials in 2003. Do you have to me mega strong to achieve THAT time?
One MORE question: for the underwater pullout after a turn, is there a breathing pattern that saves the most energy? I have a very irregular breathing pattern - I breathe out fast right after the turn, saves some air in my lungs, then breathe out most of the remaining air after the pull. Is that efficient? Something tells me it is not very.
Thanks a lot for your reply.
I do a lot of eggbeater, not just for breaststroke but for lifesaving lessons you need to do them all the time.
I feel it difficult to visualize hip flexibility, although I know the term and I know its importance. Could you elaborate just what a person with a flexible hip can do that a person with a stiff hip can't do? Thanks.
I've watched a lot of slow-motion underwater videos of breaststrokers as well as race videos played frame by frame and full speed. I've watched them so much that I can memorize and recite the commentary for the 100m and 200m male breaststroke events in 2005 Montreal, as well as other videos. But the point is, I haven't caught what an ankle snap is supposed to look like. Is it a snap from the usual position to straight or overbent, like in flutterkick? Or is it a snap from the soles of your feet facing outwards to facing each other like when you are clapping??
And one more question for the underwater pullout. Is it because of my poor lung capacity that I'm so tired after one of these? Because I feel about 500 times more tired coming out of a turn than when I was going into the turn. I usually feel almost no pain in the legs going into a turn during a Short Course 50m sprint, but coming out of the turn my legs start hurting like hell. Is it all because of my lung capacity??
Thanks very much to everyone who replied and will reply in the future.
There you go. That's your problem.
Hold your breath until you're ready to surface. If you blow it all out at the pushoff, then naturally you're going to need more air quickly.
Jeff had some great tips.Be careful of the sitting stretch,do it slowly to avoid straining your knees. A good drill for the ankle snap that I just started doing is swim breaststroke kick with your legs straight,using only the ankle snap for propulsion. Also what helps me on the underwater pullout is to think of it as a time to relax That doesn't mean to not streamline nor to not pull and kick REALLY HARD,but to realize that during the glide you really are not exerting yourself(it is also like flying and feels great.)
Thanks.
So the drill, that's just it - I DON'T know how to do the ankle snap. After hearing what it is from different sources, I'm getting confused now about the ankle snap.
Is it:
1) A rotation from when the soles of your feet turn out (like your hands during a breaststroke pull) to when the soles of your feet turn in (like your hands when you're clapping)?
Or
2) From when the toes are pointed outwards to pointing towards each other?
Thanks. Any other ankle flexibility drills I can do? Cuz I don't really get the former one.
