Tricks of the Trade

get your cap wet before you put it on. keep your racing suit dry before you race. Don't warm up in your racing suit don't breathe on the last stroke into a turn or your first stroke out of a turn ande A good idea for a thread. It sounds liks you are talking about race-day "tricks," which I think are highly individualized (though there are some common habits that are probably good or bad ideas). In fact, what stikes me about your examples is that I do the OPPOSITE of every one of them! The breathing in/out of the turn is a bad habit of mine, I'll admit. As for the suit... One of my biggest problems with the technical suits is losing the feel for the water. I used to do what you say...but I found that I can re-gain a measure of the feel for the water by wearing the suit in warmup. Plus, if possible I like to warm up until JUST before I swim, and I don't want to get out just to put my suit on. It may go against the prevailing superstition -- I mean, wisdom -- concerning the suits, but I honestly think the "dry/buoyancy" thing is a nonfactor. And since backstroke is my best stroke, the suit is going to be wet for those events anyway. Chris

get your cap wet before you put it on. keep your racing suit dry before you race. Don't warm up in your racing suit don't breathe on the last stroke into a turn or your first stroke out of a turn ande A good idea for a thread. It sounds liks you are talking about race-day "tricks," which I think are highly individualized (though there are some common habits that are probably good or bad ideas). In fact, what stikes me about your examples is that I do the OPPOSITE of every one of them! The breathing in/out of the turn is a bad habit of mine, I'll admit. As for the suit... One of my biggest problems with the technical suits is losing the feel for the water. I used to do what you say...but I found that I can re-gain a measure of the feel for the water by wearing the suit in warmup. Plus, if possible I like to warm up until JUST before I swim, and I don't want to get out just to put my suit on. It may go against the prevailing superstition -- I mean, wisdom -- concerning the suits, but I honestly think the "dry/buoyancy" thing is a nonfactor. And since backstroke is my best stroke, the suit is going to be wet for those events anyway. Chris