Breath on one side or two?

I can breathe both sides I prefer to breathe only on the left side. I will occasionally bilateral breathe to watch another swimmer swimming on my right side.

I have always preferred breathing "left" and only over the last year have I worked on also breathing right. I agree that breathing both sides fosters a more balanced stroke. But I haven't seen any evidence that it is an important factor for success. As some have pointed out already - many elite swimmers breathe on one side. At the PanPacs last year I think all four (Jones, Lezak, Walker, Phelps) men on the WR setting 4x100 relay breathed on one side. I have another thought - you can adapt to being VERY good and efficient breathing on one side instead of just OK breathing on both sides. No evidence either that loping is bad. Phelps and Lezak both have a lope. I breathe both sides while warming up and warming down. Sometimes breathe both sides on moderate stuff - but when I always breathe left on hard stuff.

I breathe on both sides. I think it helps keep your stroke even and prevents "loping" and shoulder imbalances/injuries.

Breathing to one side only (and poor stroke mechanics) led to my having a shoulder injury almost 2 years ago. Because of the pain, and my unwillingness to stop training, I forced myself to learn to breathe to the other side and now can go comfortably to either side. I make an effort to not use my arm as a "lever" to help turn to breathe but let the body rotation do most of the work. I now breathe to both sides during my workouts though I don't do alternate breathing. I'll switch every few strokes or every length and so forth. When racing I find that I breathe mainly to one side.

I have always been told to practice breathing to both sides, but in races do whatever comes natural or feels better. Breathing on both sides evens out your stroke so that one shoulder does not get more overworked than the other...in fact, my shoulder injury originated because I practiced 6000+ yards a day and only breathed to one side. Now I do a 3-2-3-2 breathing pattern during practice and in long races, but in sprints I still breath only to one side. Some coaches like you to breath to both sides during meets simply because it allows you to see both sides of you--and track anyone who is pulling ahead and so such.

I've tried to breathe bilaterally but I get a terrible stitch-in-the-side cramp when I swim that way. When I say "terrible" I mean by endurance athlete standards. I have a high pain threshold, I can ignore a lot, but this is BAD. I've tried swimming through it and observed in amazement as the pain grows, and grows, and grows... When I go back to breathing to my left, I have no problems, other than an occasionally sore left shoulder. Does this confirm defect(s) in my stroke technique? Sure, but... aahhh I don't care.

I've tried to breathe bilaterally but I get a terrible stitch-in-the-side cramp when I swim that way. When I say "terrible" I mean by endurance athlete standards. I have a high pain threshold, I can ignore a lot, but this is BAD. I've tried swimming through it and observed in amazement as the pain grows, and grows, and grows... When I go back to breathing to my left, I have no problems, other than an occasionally sore left shoulder. Does this confirm defect(s) in my stroke technique? Sure, but... aahhh I don't care. That Guy, I had that problem when I was first coerced into bilateral breathing. However, I don't think mine was as bad as yours seems to be. ANYWAY, I fought through it and ended up forcing myself to swim entire practices breathing to my weak side (left). It helped a lot, to the point where I think I now have a better technique when breathing to my left than I do when breathing to the right. I train with a lot of 3/2 breathing now, and while the right is still my strong side, I would say most of my races, even sprints, are 50/50 R/L breathing.

My first masters coach pushed breathing on both sides, so now I can do better with it than I did at first, but I never am quite comfortable with it. However, as others have suggested, it does seem to be good for injury prevention. When I go too long breathing on one side, I find that my hip and shoulder start to feel tight, so I need to switch sides for balance. But breathing to the left feels more natural to me. Here's a question I've been curious about on this subject: often when I breathe to the nondominant side (for me, the right), I notice that more water leaks into my goggles when doing so than when I breathe on the comfortable side. I usually have to stop and adjust my goggles to make sure they're tight after even just a hundred or so yards of bilateral breathing. That is less noticable if breathing to the left side only. But I can't see why the goggles would take in more water on one side than the other--and why wouldn't this be the case for left side breathing?

Interesting thing going on with me: My stroke count per 25 yards is usually 1 less if I swim the entire length breathing my bad side. So maybe my stroke is more correct when I breathe that way. But for now I am slightly faster when breathing on my good side.

Here's a question I've been curious about on this subject: often when I breathe to the nondominant side (for me, the right), I notice that more water leaks into my goggles when doing so than when I breathe on the comfortable side. I usually have to stop and adjust my goggles to make sure they're tight after even just a hundred or so yards of bilateral breathing. That is less noticable if breathing to the left side only. But I can't see why the goggles would take in more water on one side than the other--and why wouldn't this be the case for left side breathing? You must twist your face or squint or do something different when you breathe on your off side that causes your goggles to leak. Try another, different, pair of goggles. I'm sure when I breathe on my off side I probably grimace :(