Freestyle Stroke Question

I am trying to improve my freestyle. I have been working on balance,timing,counting strokes.... This is the 1st thread I can recall where someone specifically emphasized the idea of better swimming (or athleticism in general) by learning to activate the muscles you need while deactivating the ones you don’t need at the time. If you want some specialized training on this concept I strongly recommend an earnest study of Yoga. The 1st thing I look at in any swimmer is how relaxed their recovery is. I find this to be a tell-all sign, especially in front crawl. Tension between the upper and lower body is a big factor too, but harder to see (yet easy to feel if you pay attention). This link leads to a page that includes an incredibly detailed analysis of Ian thorp’s free technique. www.swimmingworldmagazine.com/.../200007-01st_art.asp This nugget is what really gets my attention: "The fact that Thorpe takes five-tenths of a second to accomplish this movement in a 1.5-second total stroke cycle demonstrates the importance of this positioning movement to the stroke." A recent thread here included a link to this site where I found the following article. It advocates slowing down to get faster/better, which is pretty much the core of my swimming philosophy. www.svl.ch/svl_swim_like_a_fish.html HTH Have Fun!

Olympic athletes tend to be genetically blessed with large variations in fast and slow twitch fibers that perfectly suit their sport. Olympic sprinters have been shown to possess about 80% fast twitch fibers while those who excel in the marathon may have 80% slow twitch fibers.

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. If someone has time, will you please put the article into simplier terms? When the author starts mentioning "addicution/abducition,etc,etc" it does get confusing for me, at least. The article seems like it was well thought out and is informative, if I could have a better understand of the concepts. Thanks, David

Terry you bring back great memories I sat through a few of his lectures, he coached a friend of mine Bill Yorzyk. His lectures were very simple and used a lot of hands on hands stuff, he pulled me out his group and had me come on stage with him and he manipulated my arms and shoulders to demonstrate. He loved to be called Coach.

Fly was in the learning stage at that time. Bill later came to swim at University of Tornto I raced Bill Yorzyk and Jack Nelson who was another non swimmer turned flyer, he came 3rd at the same Olympics. I was only a 100 flyer.

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.

Just remembering another time he called me up on stage with others, he was explaining body structure I forget what he called my structure but he mentiond my flab in the middle. Doc Councillman explained things even more simple than Silva. Doc took videos of me swimming, he asked why I bent my arms underwater so much. He coached George Breen were the 2 beat kick came from. Breens kick was almost a scissor kick and he had a huge crossover stroke. He won the heats for the 1500m at those same Olympics but lost the final to a swimmer with a slower time. Councillman said to me during the race that Breen was not finishing his stroke.

Terry: One of my teammates told me tonight that I was doing exactly what you described as undesirable -- pushing my hands past my hips on freestyle. He said it causes me to overrotate and may be contributing to my shoulder problems. He's probably right; I know an early exit is now the preferred method. My question is, is there any drill to help learn this technique or should I just practice giving up on the stroke sooner and exiting with a bent elbow? I'd really rather just swim fly and back, but since fly is tough on my shoulders, I guess I have to learn to do freestyle correctly.... Thanks. Leslie

Hi Terry, My coach is a big fan of the single arm drill you described (arm at side). I HATE this drill, which definitely means that I need to work on it more. :D Thanks for the additional explanations - gives me some more to think about next time I work on it. FYI to Leslie, Don't be surprised if when you first try this drill it is very slow... especially if you're used to drilling one-arm freestyle with the other arm out in front. However, you'll probably feel like you're flying compared to your caterpillar drill. :D Carrie

This is all very intersting for me. I am not a gifted athelete or speller so all of this is difficult for me. Four days ago I tried some of this in practice and was amazed at how my times went down, 3 seconds per 50, and stayed consistant for my hour. The next day my abdominal muscles were tender from the new technique. I then missed two days and went back to the pool and for the life of me could not get a good stroke or feel for the water. I could tell that my old stroke was back and was extremely ineffecient. I am going to swim tomorrow and hope someone has a suggestion. This may be a case of I thought I was doing what I read but.... Have a great day Paul