i am 26 yrs old and never learnt swimming .. i have recently joined swimming class ..infact i hv just finished one class ... here i was taught the basic of swimming one of which is to keep ur feet above water and kick the water using ur feet .... i just cudnt do it ... i used to get it whn the instructor held me but cud never do it well on my own ...i weigh around 100 lb ... there were 2 other people in my group much older to me ... however they managed to do it real well ... i am really disappointed with myself and discouraged .. do you think i will ever be able to do that ... i cant even practice on my own in my community pool as thr is no1 to guide me ... how can i keep the feet above water ?? every time i try to do it my feet automatically goes down and i am noe able to float ... is thr any trick to do this .. pls help ...
You need to breathe all your air out, so you can get a fresh supply when you breathe. The air in your lungs is not the only contributing factor of keeping afloat, body position as you have found out is more important. To practice breathing all your air out, do bobs, go under breathe it all out, come up, breath in, do again. You can also hang on the side of the pool with legs out floating, so you are lying stomach down and practice doing the breathing in and out to the side. The side rotation breathing is a hard skill for someone who is trying to learn as an adult(actually for kids as well), and takes practice. You will find one side feels better than the other, but practice on both sides.
I agree with Matt that watching good swimmers, especially what they do underwater is good. I love to swim next to the Senior/National team from our swim team and watch their body positions, and how they stroke the water and turn. And then I do poor imitations!
George, I know what you mean, but I have coaches tell me the reason people have trouble with the breathing is because they don't exhale all their air out into the water, so when they turn to breathe, they end up exhaling, before inhaling, and therefore disrupt the timing. This also leaves more CO2 in the lunges, and leads to the breathlessness feeling that many new swimmers get. Does that make sense?
And I guess my description does sound like I mean go under and blow out hard, but that isn't what I meant((come on read my mind). It is true it is a slower exhaling, not a forceful exhaling, like breathing out underwater. For a newbie, this is a hard concept because breathing out naturally underwater is not a comfortable feeling. Again, observing a skilled swimmer underwater is a good way to see this.
One thing to note, I know several swimmers who have asthma. When doing breathe control swims of breathing every 5, or 7 or 9, they cannot do the slow controled exhale. They actually hold their breath until last couple strokes and then exhale it out. They have found with their asthma, this helps them not have breathing difficulties.
The slow controled exhale is especially helpful to learn for turns. There is no way I would have been able to learn a flip turn until I learned to breathe out in a controled way.
dorothyrde
Lets not breathe all the air out, every one may try to do this and exagerate the action, I believe (but it may be disputed) that the exhale portion should not be a complete forcing of the air out. Breathing should be natural almost the same as you would do for a jog or bicycle ride. I have never seen any athlete breathe all of his or her air out no matter the sport.
When I teach swimming I teach students to blow all of the air out but only as a method to let the body sink to the bottom of the the pool, bobbing and exhaling, rolling while kicking and breathing on the side. My critisim was not in the theory of a coach saying exhale all the air, it is the over exagerating that happens and of course I just think it is wrong to say Exhale all the air.
I don't have any problem asthma but maybe because of my age I have trouble when doing breath control swims of breathing every 5, or 7 or 9.
Originally posted by payydro
i alway came to the conclusion that if you breath all air out while swimming you will sink and have to trouble and raise up for air and distrupt your balance
If you exhaust all the air out of your lungs and don’t move you’ll probably sink like a rock. If you have some forward momentum however, it is easier to expel more air, still remain afloat, and not break your rhythm. But getting from the point of doing beginner breath drills to hydroplaning on a sprint is a gradual process. The hours of practice and conditioning can get pretty boring, so try to make if fun and interesting.
Maintaining as natural a breathing rhythm as possible is ideal. Obviously you will breathe more or less labored depending on how much you exert yourself (as in the difference between walking and running). Since in swimming there is a lot less time to take air in than let it out, it naturally makes more sense to exhale underwater (either slowly or all at once) before you lift your head up to take in air. The better you can refresh your lungs, the better your endurance will be.
Breath drills (either on land or in the water) are no different that doing things like “catch-up drills”, and other stroke drills. These drills are simply a way to extend your knowledge of your capacity and help to develop a sub-conscious “memory” for that task. This memory will hopefully carry over to the actual event when you are distracted by everything happening at once (including “not drowning”). Drills frequently extend or exaggerate a small part of a process, so that when the effort is put into regular practice it will come out right. Simply paying attention to how you feel while going through the water will usually inform you about what is right amount of effort.
Doing stretching exercises (like Yoga) to increase your flexibility (especially in your neck, shoulders, chest, and waist) will help a great deal in swimming. That, along with practice, study, and asking questions will take you a long way in a relatively short period of time. You will be even further challenged when you try to start answering questions. ;-)
Initially (just as a friendly tip), I probably would not do any heavy experimentation with expelling all the air in your lungs while in the deep end… not that there’s anything wrong with that. :-D
Somewhat related to this topic was a post in this forum regarding an underwater record that sparked some interesting responses regarding the pros and cons of holding the breath, which may be worth a look.
