Hi there, new-ish swimmers!
My name is Barb and I was a lurker. Then I registered and lurked some more. I heard all sorts of terms (long-axis/short-axis, SDKs, slippage - to name a few) that the more seasoned swimmers were tossing around and had no clue what they referred to, much less meant. I was a little shy about asking for clarification on some basic issues within a thread where something was being discussed or debated.
I would like to create a space here for swimmers who are either new-ish to swimming, fitness swimming, or maybe competitive swimming to ask basic questions, the ones you're embarrassed to ask. If you don't want to ask them yourself, register and send me a private message, and I'll ask it for you.
I don't have the answers, but many of the posters here have been and are helpful and supportive of me and probably will be the same for you.
Parents
Former Member
You just described me. My coaches kept telling me that I was dropping my elbow, but couldn't really tell me what I was doing to stop it. I recently started to feel the water more and have less slippage in the last half of the underwater stroke.
How do I know that my elbow is dropping? I have very inflexible shoulders but have been working on it. 6 months ago, my hand entry would be near my forehead and because of my lack of flexibility would push my hand forward underwater into a kind of Hitler salute (palm down but below me). I know recover my arm completely above the water and my palm comes down on to the water. I think I went from one extreme to the other in trying to fix my elbow problem.
I've been helping some triathletes here in Texas with this problem. Most every single one of them start the hand entry right by their ears or head instead of the arm entering straight ahead (at shoulder width with a longer reach). This creates a second problem to the slippage: it causes them to "fishtail" as they swim rather than more in a straight line. Once they started correcting this, they also started swimming forward and more straight AND with slippage reductions they travel faster.
The fingertip drill helped them immensely, as did keeping an eye on their elbow being higher than the hand on the pull portion. I think for lots of people that dropping the elbow is just comfortable, but is a terrible habit.
And it sounds as if you are making great corrections; way to go Bill!
Donna
You just described me. My coaches kept telling me that I was dropping my elbow, but couldn't really tell me what I was doing to stop it. I recently started to feel the water more and have less slippage in the last half of the underwater stroke.
How do I know that my elbow is dropping? I have very inflexible shoulders but have been working on it. 6 months ago, my hand entry would be near my forehead and because of my lack of flexibility would push my hand forward underwater into a kind of Hitler salute (palm down but below me). I know recover my arm completely above the water and my palm comes down on to the water. I think I went from one extreme to the other in trying to fix my elbow problem.
I've been helping some triathletes here in Texas with this problem. Most every single one of them start the hand entry right by their ears or head instead of the arm entering straight ahead (at shoulder width with a longer reach). This creates a second problem to the slippage: it causes them to "fishtail" as they swim rather than more in a straight line. Once they started correcting this, they also started swimming forward and more straight AND with slippage reductions they travel faster.
The fingertip drill helped them immensely, as did keeping an eye on their elbow being higher than the hand on the pull portion. I think for lots of people that dropping the elbow is just comfortable, but is a terrible habit.
And it sounds as if you are making great corrections; way to go Bill!
Donna
