As quoted in the AP article:
"You'll all have to see. I'm not saying anything until we unveil it," Phelps said with a grin when asked how he's tweaked the stroke. "It's a significant change. You'll be able to tell exactly what I did as soon as I take my first stroke."
He's on tap to swim the 100- and 200-meter free and the 100 butterfly at the Charlotte UltraSwim in NC. Should be interesting to see.
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We are going to see a horde of people playing with this staright arm recovery...as Jonty Skinner recently pointed out (and Bowman concurs in todays USA Today) the new suit technology allows swimmers the buoyancy to maintain this far more fatiguing/powerful technique. I've been playing with it for 6 months but have yet to give it a shot in a meet...
Swimming always does this...following trends I mean. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. But, teaching a straight arm recovery to everyone will be a mistake the same as trying to teach everyone to do the high elbow recovery was a mistake.
It will be slow unless you have already have serious speed to make it work.
My guess is many people will focus on what their arms look like above water and unless it is somehow connected to what's going on underneath it won't make any real difference.
Is it the speed that creates the technique or the technique that creates the speed? For instance, put fins on and sprint a 100 free. See what happens to your recovery with the additional speed. I know my arms naturally go a little straighter. Its just the natural result of the increase in speed for me.
What I think is great is it has stopped some coaches from forcing a high elbow recovery on everyone. Now hopefully in time we'll learn that you can't force a straight arm recovery on everyone either.
We are going to see a horde of people playing with this staright arm recovery...as Jonty Skinner recently pointed out (and Bowman concurs in todays USA Today) the new suit technology allows swimmers the buoyancy to maintain this far more fatiguing/powerful technique. I've been playing with it for 6 months but have yet to give it a shot in a meet...
Swimming always does this...following trends I mean. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. But, teaching a straight arm recovery to everyone will be a mistake the same as trying to teach everyone to do the high elbow recovery was a mistake.
It will be slow unless you have already have serious speed to make it work.
My guess is many people will focus on what their arms look like above water and unless it is somehow connected to what's going on underneath it won't make any real difference.
Is it the speed that creates the technique or the technique that creates the speed? For instance, put fins on and sprint a 100 free. See what happens to your recovery with the additional speed. I know my arms naturally go a little straighter. Its just the natural result of the increase in speed for me.
What I think is great is it has stopped some coaches from forcing a high elbow recovery on everyone. Now hopefully in time we'll learn that you can't force a straight arm recovery on everyone either.
