I'm always under the touch pad and don't get my splits

The same thing has happened to me a few times. My turns on distance events aren't that great. On sprints I get turned around in a hurry though. There is the size of the touch pad too. Some are taller than others. I am sloppy and also twist while turning.

The American way to solve this is to sue the pad manufacturers. Surely there has been heartbreak and suffering as a result of missing the splits! :rant3:

My LCM 50 is 30.26 and my SCM 50 is 29.78. Does this reaveal a crummy turn? I have always counted on an average spread of about 0.65 sec. between LCM & SCM with speeds of about 27 high for LCM and 27 low for SCM. (Does speed make a difference?) I like to think my turns are OK; maybe not great but not crummy. Rob's spread of 0.48 does seem on the slow side - I cannot imagine not hitting the touchpad, however. What spreads do others have? Just curious.

Ian, According to your differential, my turn could probably be a bit better, but I think in the longer distances I am getting sloppy and lazy. Ande, Pwolf, You are right. Racing must be instinctual and second nature. It must be worked on in practice. Besides my time goals for this year, My goal is to record all splits.

there's your problem I am ignoring it in practice perfect it in practice you've got a sloppy habit that's costing you you go deeper by controlling the depth of your upper body on turns watch what michael phelps does in the Olympic Trials unde water footage he slightly under rotates his upper body which allows him a deeper trajectory for his push off so he pushes off into still water instead of water moving the opposite direction he's headed Does this reaveal a crummy turn? YES I guess I am not tucking enough. I will work on it. It is a real problem for me. I am ignoring it in practice and then at meets I screw it all up. I guess I don't mind a deeper turn in practice because I can push off and get under the incoming wave. Maybe this is costing me some time. My LCM 50 is 30.26 and my SCM 50 is 29.78. Does this reaveal a crummy turn?

I guess I am not tucking enough. I will work on it. It is a real problem for me. I am ignoring it in practice and then at meets I screw it all up. Remember, practice is to set good habits and to make them automatic. By setting a bad habit in practice, the only way to overcome that in a race is to be really concentrating on not doing it, which is a less than desirable outcome. A perfect race is one where your mind is just along for the ride. If you have to concentrate on too many things (hand position, breathing, kicking, turning, etc), you will not be relaxed and able to do your best. My best 50yd free ever was leading off a relay. This has stuck out in my mind ever since. Immediately following my swim, all I remember is the starter's gun and then touching the wall, I remembered absolutely nothing else about the swim. My coach asked me what I did differently, was I kicking more, how was my rotation, how many strokes, etc. and I just said 'I don't recall anything' My mind was completely along for the ride and the body did what it was trained to do in practice. That is where I am trying to get back to. and that is why it is critical to set good habits in practice so that you don't have to think about what you need to do, you can just do it.

Not sure about the math they use on that site: When I put in 27.07 LCM it converted to 23.82 SCY but when I put in 23.63 SCY it converted to 27.47 LCM. Weird.

Speed counts. I guess if you are a slower swimmer, they figure the turn is a bigger benefit. I guess this sort of makes sense. Faster swimmers will also have faster turns, but there's also an inherent benefit in the flip turn because it effectively shrinks the pool a little. Faster swimmers derive slightly less time benefit from this shrinking because they could cover that distance in less time than slower swimmers. Women on average are shorter than men, so they aren't shrinking the pool as much on turns as men, thus the substantial difference between men and women on the conversion. That site doesn't convert 50s of other strokes, but I would suspect the difference between men and women would be slightly less in events where open turns are used (fly and ***) because height is no longer a factor in turns.

I guess this sort of makes sense. Faster swimmers will also have faster turns, but there's also an inherent benefit in the flip turn because it effectively shrinks the pool a little. Faster swimmers derive slightly less time benefit from this shrinking because they could cover that distance in less time than slower swimmers. Women on average are shorter than men, so they aren't shrinking the pool as much on turns as men, thus the substantial difference between men and women on the conversion. That site doesn't convert 50s of other strokes, but I would suspect the difference between men and women would be slightly less in events where open turns are used (fly and ***) because height is no longer a factor in turns. If you use the converter to do 100s, it goes: (Based on 1:00) Male Female Diff Free 57.78 58.50 0.72 Back 55.92 57.12 1.20 *** 57.30 58.26 0.96 Fly 58.14 58.74 0.60 The converter just multiplies a factor by the time entered, so the differences are going to be larger when the time gets larger.

Out of curiosity I checked the SwimAZ.com converter to see what they used as the spread between SCM & LCM - presumedly due to the turn. www.swimaz.com/.../ How much the turn is worth is split Male/Female LCM 50 Time----Female SCM Faster by:----Male SCM Faster by: 25-----------------0.70-------------------1.00 26-----------------0.73-------------------1.04 27-----------------0.76-------------------1.08 28-----------------0.79-------------------1.12 29-----------------0.82-------------------1.16 30-----------------0.84-------------------1.21 Speed counts. I guess if you are a slower swimmer, they figure the turn is a bigger benefit. If you check their 100 conversion and divide the difference by 2 (two extra turns in SCM), the turns are not as fast. (not sure of my logic here). Anyway, as a male, I now downgrade my turn to 'crummy'. Ande was right. (age must count; old=slow). Ian.