I am trying to improve my freestyle. I have been working on balance,timing,counting strokes.
When watching videos of world classs swimmers, I noticed that on swimmers like Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte, that their arm in the water is fully extended(straight) and angled below the corresponding shoulder. It looks as though the arm that is about to catch the water is angled to where it points towards where the pool wall and pool bottom meet. Not pointed directly down but not pointed directly straight out from the shoulder to the wall.
It seems like most of the best freestylers have their extended arms pointed below their bottom shoulder at an angle before the pull. This also appears to only happen once they have finished the rotation to that side.
Has anyone else noticed this or am I way off?
Thanks,
David
Parents
Former Member
I finished reading the article that Bud linked from Swimming World. After reading the article three times, I feel as I must go back to medical school for a degree to understand a lot of the points....
I know the feeling, I’ve had the same reaction. But I at least got the idea that shoulder positioning is of fundamental importance. After reading this article a few years ago I began experimenting with different shoulder positioning before I’d start my front crawl pull. All of this made me a bit more aware of differences regarding which muscles can be activated in the pull, especially those going down into the core of the body.
I thought I had a pretty good idea of how core body muscles are used in free, back, and *** until I began a detailed study and practice of butterfly. In the first year or two of this process I made giant leaps in understanding how core body muscles apply to swimming. I highly recommend getting a proficient understanding of fly to anyone who is serious about improving their swimming efficiency.
I’ve always tried to get propulsion past the hip in my front crawl stroke. I guess I need to rethink this. Thanks to Terry for the more digestible breakdown of “Silvia's ‘Big Four’", I’ve pasted it to my notes with Adams’ article.
I finished reading the article that Bud linked from Swimming World. After reading the article three times, I feel as I must go back to medical school for a degree to understand a lot of the points....
I know the feeling, I’ve had the same reaction. But I at least got the idea that shoulder positioning is of fundamental importance. After reading this article a few years ago I began experimenting with different shoulder positioning before I’d start my front crawl pull. All of this made me a bit more aware of differences regarding which muscles can be activated in the pull, especially those going down into the core of the body.
I thought I had a pretty good idea of how core body muscles are used in free, back, and *** until I began a detailed study and practice of butterfly. In the first year or two of this process I made giant leaps in understanding how core body muscles apply to swimming. I highly recommend getting a proficient understanding of fly to anyone who is serious about improving their swimming efficiency.
I’ve always tried to get propulsion past the hip in my front crawl stroke. I guess I need to rethink this. Thanks to Terry for the more digestible breakdown of “Silvia's ‘Big Four’", I’ve pasted it to my notes with Adams’ article.
