arm dominance and breathing side

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Sun, 11 Feb 2007 08:32:05 GMT

The only hting I can only do with my right hand is write. I learned to swim & flip by swiming parrallel to my brothers. They are both right handed. I learned by swiming to my left and watching them breath and flip. For a long time my flips were really weird. I can both breath and flip both right & left. I feal most comfortable flipping to the left. When I was in the sixth grade I accidently ripped my left wrist open. I had lots of rehad. That pretty much solidified me as a leftie with everyting except throwing.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 16:29:58 GMT

Handedness doens't necessarily match up with athletic sidedness. My sister writes with her left hand, but is right-sided in sports. I've also had friends that were right-handed but left-sided. I'm right-handed, right-sided for most sports, but left-eye dominant and therefore act left-handed for things like archery.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 09:45:56 GMT

I am an unreformed right/right, but I do tend to try to balance my rotation and limit my neck movement for the breath to the minimum. Wren: wouldn't it be easier to wear your skates on your feet?

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 09:02:34 GMT

I'm right handed and prefer to breath on the left. Due to a whiny right shoulder, I mostly do bi-lateral breathing. When I swim butterfly, I breath almost exclusively to the left (I can't seem to breath right).:shakeshead:

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 15:16:02 GMT

Right handed, breathe right . . . though I am trying really hard to breathe every third stroke. I also take my first stroke with my right hand - on backstroke too. A bit off topic, but I skate left handed. :dunno:

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 13:46:57 GMT

I breathe to either side but am not ambidextrous so I can't vote. I wonder if there is a handedness/first arm to pull out of a turn correlation...

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

poolraat — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 10:53:09 GMT

I also like to breathe on one side for a while and then switch (rather than alternating on each stroke). I am rt handed, but feel pretty comfortable breathing on either side. It comes in especially handy for open water swimming, so you can sight and/or avoid having the sun in your eyes. I found out in an open water swim that I have a tendency to drift in the direction of the side I'm breathing on so being able to breathe to either side kept me somewhat on course. (I probably ziz zaged an extra 100 or two. No wonder it took so long!)

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

poolraat — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 09:02:22 GMT

I breathe to either side but am not ambidextrous so I can't vote. I wonder if there is a handedness/first arm to pull out of a turn correlation... I'm not sure about the first arm pull thing but I used to take the first arm pull with the right arm and I am right handed. I had to make a conscious effort to switch to the "bottom" arm which was the left. Now I don't even think about it, it just seems natural.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 08:17:21 GMT

I'm right handed and breathe on the right. Am working on bilateral but feels really weird but have been told it "looks" natural. I swim slightly crooked when I breathe on the left and totally in a straight line when breathing on the right. I am also a front breather because I am an ocean swimmer and have to look up for sighting occasionally. Donna

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

knelson — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 01:30:54 GMT

The Swiss have a term "the chocolate side" for which half of your body is generally more limber, flexible, etc. I think they use this for skiing--it's easier to execute certain skiing maneuvers (I'm not a skiier myself, so I am not sure what I mean here by maneuvers, but it probably has to do with kick turns, etc.) on the chocolate side Yeah, just turns in general. I'm much better turning one way than the other. You find this out pretty quickly on narrow cat tracks that force you to make tight turns.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 17:54:11 GMT

Im not sure what their dominate hand is but thorpe- right hacket- right crocker- right Hogenban- left schoeman- left phelps- left I thought Thorpe could switch at will? I might have dreamt that.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 17:35:39 GMT

Im bilateral because thats what I was taught at a young age. I'm right handed and i think im more comfortable breathing on the left. I havnt really noticed in other people what is natural but I would think that a right handed person breathing to the left is natural because think of it this way... when your breath you are basicly spining and the natural way to spin is to the left. try it, stand in place and spin in each direction which one feels natural? its to the left for most people.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 17:20:53 GMT

I'm right handed and only breathe on my left. Only breathe when right arm is extended for the pull. Right side doesn't feel right. So I'm a lefty righty.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 17:11:22 GMT

Im not sure what their dominate hand is but thorpe- right hacket- right crocker- right Hogenban- left schoeman- left phelps- left

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 16:25:46 GMT

I'm about 80% left handed and breathe to my right 100% of the time. If God had meant us to breathe bilaterally he would have given us two mouths.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 15:20:13 GMT

I voted for right/ right, but over the last 8 years with my current masters team, have developed a really good left-side breathing skill. I tend to do a 3/2 breathing pattern these days, and for whatever reason, whenever it becomes 2/2, it tends to be left-side focused. For the shorter races, the few breaths I take are mostly to the right. I will note that it feels like I get a stronger pull from my left arm, which I think makes sense from the right-side breathing, as that arm would be underwater holding me up at the surface while I breathe. :dedhorse: when I go left breathe I have to work on not pulling too soon...otherwise I glug instead of breathe.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 13:30:57 GMT

Right handed and breath left.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 13:05:39 GMT

Right Right Forcing my self to go bilateral...3 strokes.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

poolraat — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 12:42:32 GMT

I took some lessons from a woman who swam for Wisconsin. She mentioned that her coach had changed her flip turn rotation to better match up with her first arm stroke, so there is evidently some school of thought about this. She didn't elaborate, and I didn't follow-up. I was told by a coach that the first stroke after the turn should be taken with the arm closest to the bottom. I didn't change my turn rotation though, just changed which arm was taking the first stoke and by doing so it also made it easier to take at least 2 strokes before breathing after each turn (something else the coach was constantly emphasizing).

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

BillS — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 12:29:01 GMT

Naturally right/right, but comfortable bilateral breather now. This whole breathing business and handedness also seem to influence directions of flip turns. I am trying to remember which direction my body angles off the wall at (left or right tilted downwards) but for some reason can't recall this. I do know that I take my first stroke wrong--you should probably use whatever arm is deeper, but I tend not to do so. I took some lessons from a woman who swam for Wisconsin. She mentioned that her coach had changed her flip turn rotation to better match up with her first arm stroke, so there is evidently some school of thought about this. She didn't elaborate, and I didn't follow-up.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

poolraat — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 12:10:28 GMT

Right handed, used to breath to right side almost exclusively. Injured left shoulder and because of the discomfort began breathing to the left. Am now comfortable breathing to either side. Don't alternate breathe but throughout a workout will switch every 2,3 4 breaths or by laps or whatever. One thing I've noticed since learning to breathe to the left is that my balance is better when I breathe left. My hips drop slightly when I breathe to the right.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

jim thornton — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 11:52:53 GMT

Michele--I apologize; screwed up a bit with my poll, not knowing exactly how to do one. I put down the possible answers in the text part, then submitted it, and the poll form came up, and I tried to recreate the answers from memory... Ivor--might I just say that Upwithbeavers is an extremely funny website. Like Ricky Gervais bringing The Office to America, I would love to get an Americanized UPwithBeavers version for the US of A. Finally, in terms of breathing generally, this poll has proved revealing, at least to me. The Swiss have a term "the chocolate side" for which half of your body is generally more limber, flexible, etc. I think they use this for skiing--it's easier to execute certain skiing maneuvers (I'm not a skiier myself, so I am not sure what I mean here by maneuvers, but it probably has to do with kick turns, etc.) on the chocolate side than on the non-chocolate (vanilla?) side. I learned about the "chocolate side" from a yoga teacher years ago, who used it to explain why some contortionistic yoga poses are so much easier to execute on one side vs. the other. I think swimming is the same. Nobody yet appears to be a natural bilateral breather. The biggest chunk of responses so far is a discord between hand dominance and breathing side. In my own case, I am ever-so-slightly ambidextrous--I shoot a rifle and play pool left handed but do pretty much everything else right handed. I wonder if this might figure in to my own discord (right handed for the most part; breathe on the left side.] This whole breathing business and handedness also seem to influence directions of flip turns. I am trying to remember which direction my body angles off the wall at (left or right tilted downwards) but for some reason can't recall this. I do know that I take my first stroke wrong--you should probably use whatever arm is deeper, but I tend not to do so. I wonder if anyone has scientifically studied swimming, handedness, etc. I guess it matters less in fly and breaststroke...

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

m2tall2 — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 11:22:03 GMT

"I am one side dominant, but have trained my self to be a comfortable bilateral breather" This is an option in your text but not in your poll. So I didn't vote. I would defintely vote for this one. I remember starting out I naturally was a right/right breather but I've trained myself to be bilateral so naturally that even when gasping for air either side feels comfortable.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Former Member — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 10:45:17 GMT

I was first to vote for left and left. Glad to see some others have joined the club.

RE: arm dominance and breathing side

Muppet — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 10:13:31 GMT