Hi again,
I watched the Pan Pacs last weekend and noticed most everyone is using the track start now. Does anyone know who gets credit for introducing the track start to the swimming world? If so, when was it introduced? As a starting point, I will admit switching to the track start in my sophomore year in college- way back in nineteen hundred and eighty four.
I also noticed everyone, including the sprinters, is putting the underwater butterfly kick to good effect. I was pretty surprised to see the 50m folks using it as well. It appeared that they were doing about 3 dophin kicks and then exploding to the top with a freestyle kick. Please correct me if I'm wrong here.
Racer X
I'm with Jeff and Mike on this. By all means experiment with both starts, but don't just assume the track start is faster because lots of fast swimmers are using it.
It seems to me the track start first starting getting popular about the same time when the rules changed to one false start = DQ. I'm sure many here remember the days when in short course swimming you were allowed one false start and in long course the first two false starts were charged to the field. When the rules changed coaches started teaching their swimmers the track start since it's a little more stable on the blocks.
I'm with Jeff and Mike on this. By all means experiment with both starts, but don't just assume the track start is faster because lots of fast swimmers are using it.
It seems to me the track start first starting getting popular about the same time when the rules changed to one false start = DQ. I'm sure many here remember the days when in short course swimming you were allowed one false start and in long course the first two false starts were charged to the field. When the rules changed coaches started teaching their swimmers the track start since it's a little more stable on the blocks.
