Lats? What Lats?

Here are da lats.

Of all the muscles that get sore from swimming, my lats never do. How do you make more use of your lats without a major elbow drop? Skip Over-emphasize the extension on your recovery and you will be engaging your lats a lot more.

How do you make more use of your lats without a major elbow drop? The way I get my lats into the stroke is to keep my elbows high, and concentrate on getting a strong torso rotation to the pulling side. If I just reach over my head and mimic the "over the barrel" catch, I can feel the lats on the pulling side engage. By the end of a 2-mile+ race, I am really feeling my lats and my hip flexors. Those also get sore after a hard training week.

For some reason, sprint sets seem to give my lats a good burn.

Good link but too many big words for me. ;) I agree, it has a lot of jargon, but on the plus side most of the jargon words are links that take you to the definition, and most of the definitions actually have video illustrations.

Lindsay, You are right, the lats are not primary movers in extending the arm forward but if you get your arm fully extended, they are DEFINATELY primary movers in the pulling motion. Paul

Perhaps I have my muscle actions mixed up but I have a hard time picturing using one's lats to throw the arm forward. The lats are generally used to move the arm from an elevated (when standing) position toward an arm at the side position as in a lat pulldown. This would be from the catch to the point where the elbow reaches maximum backward position and the triceps take over for the finish (push backwards). No? I would expect the arm to be recovered using the traps and deltoids. Please correct me if I've got it wrong!

Perhaps I have my muscle actions mixed up but I have a hard time picturing using one's lats to throw the arm forward. The lats are generally used to move the arm from an elevated (when standing) position toward an arm at the side position as in a lat pulldown. No? I would expect the arm to be recovered using the traps and deltoids. Please correct me if I'm mixed up! I'll be seeing my coach again tonight with luck I'll get him to walk us through it. There was a dfferent feel involving the rear delt/trap/lats in the motion, it could be something you need to just consciously feel and try out. It's not marionette style lift and push though. The arm is coming up from the side to overhead in an arc on the recovery, there is no elbow bend.

You are right, the lats are not primary movers in extending the arm forward but if you get your arm fully extended, they are DEFINATELY primary movers in the pulling motion. Thanks Paul, that's what I thought. Stud, I found this page and the links on it quite informative: www.exrx.net/.../LatissimusDorsi.html

Thanks Paul, that's what I thought. Stud, I found this page and the links on it quite informative: www.exrx.net/.../LatissimusDorsi.html Good link but too many big words for me. ;) Swimming with your lats is not a euphemism for the intiantion of the stroke, you'll engage them on the hold (and pull as Hulk said) as you throw of the other arm. I probably just rushed my description earlier, and it was late. Coach said something about engaging all those muscles in the back, so maybe I just included lats for good measure. Though in doing the motion here I can feel them engaged at the end of the pull (obviously) and start of the recovery.