Just curious, does anyone use swimming devices during practice? Besides the standard kick board or pull buoy and paddles? When I work out with the Senior group on my USS team we always warm up with the snorkle. Usually consists of 8x100's on 1:20 then we follow up warm up with a set with snorkle.
I just started using the snorkle a month ago and find it somewhat difficult to use, although I am getting used to it. I have to fight the urge to want to turn my head and breath and doing flip turns can be a challenge especially if I am winded. There have been a few times I have had to stop due to choking on water. That being said, the snorkle does work on on proper head position in the water. Another device we use is the tempo trainer. I really like this device because it works on the arm speed and gets the muscle turnover burned into memory when swimming without tempo trainer.
Greg
Greg,
I have almost no background in competitive swimming, but one summer in college I managed at a pool and swam with the training group that practiced there in the mornings. The coach had rigged up an underwater speaker with a metronome attached and used it to pace our strokes. I'm thinking maybe this is what your tempo trainer is like? Anyways, he would set the pace usually between 0.7 - 1.0 sec. 1.0 sec would mean one arm pull every beat in freestyle - which is a pretty smooth tempo. 0.7 was close to a sprint. It must have looked pretty cool from the deck to see a bunch of swimmers all pulling perfectly in synch.
Greg,
I have almost no background in competitive swimming, but one summer in college I managed at a pool and swam with the training group that practiced there in the mornings. The coach had rigged up an underwater speaker with a metronome attached and used it to pace our strokes. I'm thinking maybe this is what your tempo trainer is like? Anyways, he would set the pace usually between 0.7 - 1.0 sec. 1.0 sec would mean one arm pull every beat in freestyle - which is a pretty smooth tempo. 0.7 was close to a sprint. It must have looked pretty cool from the deck to see a bunch of swimmers all pulling perfectly in synch.
