Is Breathing after every 3 strokes on diff sides help you go faster?

Bi lateral breathing is good for balance and I have done it in practice. When I race I do not breathe on both sides. Also when I race I do not wear goggles. I only race 50s and 100s so I do not do much breathing. In a fiifty maybe 2 breaths, in a hundred, maybe 8 breaths. I am a left side breather, I occasionaly breathe on the right side to look at other swimmers. I am presently down in weight and will be in shape to race in January. Got timed for a 100 yards yesterday in a twenty yard pool, all open pull-up turns. I am having trouble with my flip turns, I guess it is that I have trouble tucking, the new knees (2 years old) still give me problems. 1:05 for the 100 yards. Way to go George! :banana: Haven't seen you around here much lately or maybe I have just missed your postings. Are you left handed then? What makes a left side breather? It would be interesting to have a poll on this one: how many favour the left side for breathing and how many favour the right. I would think the right side would be the clear favourite but I may be wrong. I have been practicing bilateral breathing for barely 10 days now but already it has gotten much easier. My biggest problem has been concentrating on not lifting my head when breathing to my left. I have to keep reminding myself to roll from the hip. It just comes naturally on the right but requires immense concentration on the left. i forget which book it is, perhaps swimming fastest, but studies show that breathing only to one side throughout training leads to a muscle imbalance of up to 10%. This is an interesting comment and certainly rings true for me. The whole right side of my body is more developed than my left side. To a certain extent, I think this is natural with right handers and vice versa but if bilateral breathing can help me even out this imbalance then that is good enough reason alone to do it. At the moment, if I were to race, I would certainly only breathe to my right side. I just am not comfortable enough with bilateral breathing. It is going to take weeks, if not months to get used to it. But there have been some immediate benefits from switching to bilateral in training: it helps me to keep my left elbow high (my left elbow drops when I breathe to the right) and it is training me to take fewer breaths. (At first I felt horribly out of breath but that is getting better). Hopefully it can also go some way in helping out in the right/left body strength imbalance issue, too. Syd

Bi lateral breathing is good for balance and I have done it in practice. When I race I do not breathe on both sides. Also when I race I do not wear goggles. I only race 50s and 100s so I do not do much breathing. In a fiifty maybe 2 breaths, in a hundred, maybe 8 breaths. I am a left side breather, I occasionaly breathe on the right side to look at other swimmers. I am presently down in weight and will be in shape to race in January. Got timed for a 100 yards yesterday in a twenty yard pool, all open pull-up turns. I am having trouble with my flip turns, I guess it is that I have trouble tucking, the new knees (2 years old) still give me problems. 1:05 for the 100 yards. Way to go George! :banana: Haven't seen you around here much lately or maybe I have just missed your postings. Are you left handed then? What makes a left side breather? It would be interesting to have a poll on this one: how many favour the left side for breathing and how many favour the right. I would think the right side would be the clear favourite but I may be wrong. I have been practicing bilateral breathing for barely 10 days now but already it has gotten much easier. My biggest problem has been concentrating on not lifting my head when breathing to my left. I have to keep reminding myself to roll from the hip. It just comes naturally on the right but requires immense concentration on the left. i forget which book it is, perhaps swimming fastest, but studies show that breathing only to one side throughout training leads to a muscle imbalance of up to 10%. This is an interesting comment and certainly rings true for me. The whole right side of my body is more developed than my left side. To a certain extent, I think this is natural with right handers and vice versa but if bilateral breathing can help me even out this imbalance then that is good enough reason alone to do it. At the moment, if I were to race, I would certainly only breathe to my right side. I just am not comfortable enough with bilateral breathing. It is going to take weeks, if not months to get used to it. But there have been some immediate benefits from switching to bilateral in training: it helps me to keep my left elbow high (my left elbow drops when I breathe to the right) and it is training me to take fewer breaths. (At first I felt horribly out of breath but that is getting better). Hopefully it can also go some way in helping out in the right/left body strength imbalance issue, too. Syd