I am slow, and when I mean slow, I mean slow. I can do a 26 sec 50 with fins, but without I come in just under 1:20! I think a big part of it is just taking the fins off and doing a lot of kick sets to learn to feel the water better with my feet. I have a good breaststroke kick so I don't think my problem is an overly weak pair of legs, although they could be in better shape. Also, myankles are fairly flexible as I can point my toes and make my feet bend backwards past an even position with my shins. However, I do think that I need to loosen up my ankles when I kick. I feel like I get more out of my kick for those brief moments when I allow my ankles to snap back and forth with my kick. I think I actually need to relax more to kick faster as weird as that sounds.
I suppose the answer to my question is that I simply need to take of the fins and do kick set after kick set until I learn to feel the water better with my feet and become more efficient.
Don't smack your head to hard, just causes a headache.
I agree that having a streamlined kick will help with body position, but
how much propulsion does it really add if you are an average kicker?
As masters swimmers, not elite or college or age groupers, with limited amounts of time to train,
are we better off focusing on whole stroke swimming sets where our kick training is part of the whole stroke swimming training?
Wouldn't pulling sets(no paddles, just a buoy or ankle strap) improve our swimming at a far greater rate than kicking sets?
I know a lot of swimmers on here are great kickers, Ande, Fort, Chris S. and spend a lot of their races underwater on fly and back, so that does make sense for them to devote the time to kicking only sets but for those of us that are better on top of the water, how much can we really expect to benefit from kicking only sets?
how much propulsion does it really add if you are an average kicker?
Not much is my guess, I used to be a slow kicker then I focused on improving and became one of the fastest kickers on the team.
What I've suggest in
Help my flutter kick is horrible and Help my SDK is horrible
is if you have a horrible kick, put forth a concentrated effort for
6 weeks, or 3 months, or 6 months and find out how much you can improve your kick.
Begin by shifting your self image from
"I'm a terrible kicker." then when a kick set comes up you terribly
to
"I'm working on improving my kick."
As masters swimmers, not elite or college or age groupers, with limited amounts of time to train, are we better off focusing on whole stroke swimming sets where our kick training is part of the whole stroke swimming training?
It all depends what your goals are and how bad you want them. What your strengths and weaknesses are. There's many ways to approach training.
Wouldn't pulling sets(no paddles, just a buoy or ankle strap) improve our swimming at a far greater rate than kicking sets?
There's many ways to train. If you want to swim fast, it helps to have a fast powerful kick, the ability to control your kicking effort level and a fast easy speed kick.
so that does make sense for them to devote the time to kicking only sets but for those of us that are better on top of the water,
how much can we really expect to benefit from kicking only sets?
I'm asking poor kickers to give the "help my flutter kick is horrible" program a shot for just 6 weeks and find out if they become better kickers and if that helps them swim faster.
You can do just 1 or 2 rounds of
4 x 25 kick on :45 :50 or 1:00
odds easy evens fast or 3 easy 1 fast
The key is to rest up and kick very fast.
This would take 6 to 8 minutes per practice 3 times a week.
Swimmers will benefit from being faster more efficient better conditioned kickers. Improve your kick then use it the way you need to when you swim.
Ande
Don't smack your head to hard, just causes a headache.
I agree that having a streamlined kick will help with body position, but
how much propulsion does it really add if you are an average kicker?
As masters swimmers, not elite or college or age groupers, with limited amounts of time to train,
are we better off focusing on whole stroke swimming sets where our kick training is part of the whole stroke swimming training?
Wouldn't pulling sets(no paddles, just a buoy or ankle strap) improve our swimming at a far greater rate than kicking sets?
I know a lot of swimmers on here are great kickers, Ande, Fort, Chris S. and spend a lot of their races underwater on fly and back, so that does make sense for them to devote the time to kicking only sets but for those of us that are better on top of the water, how much can we really expect to benefit from kicking only sets?
how much propulsion does it really add if you are an average kicker?
Not much is my guess, I used to be a slow kicker then I focused on improving and became one of the fastest kickers on the team.
What I've suggest in
Help my flutter kick is horrible and Help my SDK is horrible
is if you have a horrible kick, put forth a concentrated effort for
6 weeks, or 3 months, or 6 months and find out how much you can improve your kick.
Begin by shifting your self image from
"I'm a terrible kicker." then when a kick set comes up you terribly
to
"I'm working on improving my kick."
As masters swimmers, not elite or college or age groupers, with limited amounts of time to train, are we better off focusing on whole stroke swimming sets where our kick training is part of the whole stroke swimming training?
It all depends what your goals are and how bad you want them. What your strengths and weaknesses are. There's many ways to approach training.
Wouldn't pulling sets(no paddles, just a buoy or ankle strap) improve our swimming at a far greater rate than kicking sets?
There's many ways to train. If you want to swim fast, it helps to have a fast powerful kick, the ability to control your kicking effort level and a fast easy speed kick.
so that does make sense for them to devote the time to kicking only sets but for those of us that are better on top of the water,
how much can we really expect to benefit from kicking only sets?
I'm asking poor kickers to give the "help my flutter kick is horrible" program a shot for just 6 weeks and find out if they become better kickers and if that helps them swim faster.
You can do just 1 or 2 rounds of
4 x 25 kick on :45 :50 or 1:00
odds easy evens fast or 3 easy 1 fast
The key is to rest up and kick very fast.
This would take 6 to 8 minutes per practice 3 times a week.
Swimmers will benefit from being faster more efficient better conditioned kickers. Improve your kick then use it the way you need to when you swim.
Ande
