How to become a faster sprinter?

Ok, fix your kick first. If you are splashing, you are not moving yourself through the water, you are making a show. Kick down into the water, if you feel your feet come out of the water, that is too high. A strong kick is VERY important for sprinting. Next, do weights every other day. 4 times per week is plenty. If you have a staduim (or outdoor stairs) nearby, run stairs once or twice per week. That will help your cardiovascular system and strengthen your legs and glutes - the very thing you need for starts and pushoffs. Work up to running about the equivalent of 30 flights of stairs, doing 3 flights at a time, then rest for a couple of minutes. That will approximate the energy output you will need for a 50. Get lots of rest when not training. That is easy for us old farts to do, we are tired anyway. You need to go to bed early (at least 6 days per week) and take naps during the day. You will get under 24 easily. Shoot for 22s. Good luck.

You need to concentrate of technique and form changes that can gain you the quickest returns: Start: - What is your reaction time like? - Are your hips higher than your shoulders when you are set - Is your center of gravity (i.e. balance) close to your front heel - Are you in streamline before you enter the water - Are you entering the water cleanly in a single hole - How many SDKs do you take Swim - Are you breaking out in streamline - How many strokes before you take your first breath - How many breaths do you take per length - Are you getting maximum efficiency with your stroke rate/stroke length combination Turn - Do you drive into your turn - Are you hitting the wall with your feet at about shoulder width apart and with needs bent just past 45 degrees to maximize speed/power of the push off - Are your hands in streamline before your feet make contact with the wall - Do you push off completely on your back or do you start to turn over to your stomach before you push - How many SDKs do you do off the turn Finish - at the 37.5yd mark do you put your head down and drive to the wall - do you lunge of the wall at the finish trying to get as long as you can at the touch Every one of these, executed correctly can drop as much as .1-.2 seconds so there's at least 1 second of possible improvement just in these little things.

read and apply ideas from Swim Faster Faster improve your flutter kick Help My flutter Kick is Horrible

Unless you are just starting as a competitive swimmer, I doubt you can go under 24 that soon. A 2 second drop in 50 free is huge. But you CAN make big improvements. Like said above - lifting weights everyday is too often. Your muscles probably aren't getting enough recovery time depending on what you are doing in the gym. They say it over and over - to swim fast you have to swim fast. That means in practice you should regularly do high quality swims to develop power and sprint technique. High quality means high intensity sets with more rest than you probably do typically. Sets like 10 x 50 on 2:00, best effort on each. Swim each one like a race with race quality turns and breathing. Periodically do kick sprints. Good technique (starts, turns, race execution) could produce a 1 sec drop.

How often do you breath in your 50 sprint?

Thanks alot guys! Hmm, how can i go further on my dive? my head is beneath my butt, but not by much, and i have an extremely quick reaction time, but after looking at my dive in a video, i noticed i go like straight into the water without jumping very far, how can i make myself go further in the air? Also, i usually take a breath 3/4 of the way on the 1st 25 and about half way through the second.

Andro, I am assuming you are a rail thin 14yo male. EAT. Eat a big meal after every practice. Consume food immediately after practice. Immediately after lifting. Pre morning practice: Eat whatever you can stomach before practice. If practice starts a 8am in the summers, get up early and eat. Immediately post morning practice: Eat or drink something with a lot of carbs. Recovery drink, PB&J sandwich, something. This will prep you for evening practice. Post morning practice: Eat a big meal. I don’t know your yardage or you body comp, but this meal can easily be 1k+ calories. 2k might be fine. Lunch: Don’t miss it. Pre evening practice: Snack if practice is far away from lunch. Don’t go to practice hungry, either eat more at lunch or figure out an appropriate snack. Immediately post evening practice: Same as morning, just less important. Post evening practice: Dinner LIFT HEAVY. You want to do 3-4 exercises per workout, 2-3 times a week, low rep, high weight. This is what I suggest. One set of 5 with the bar, one set of 3 at 65% of your working weight and 3-5 sets of 5 reps at your working weight. Increase working weight every workout, and keep a journal. Do squats every workout, then bench press and pull ups on A day and shoulder press and rows on B day. Your only goal in the gym is to build strength; the pool will take care of all your endurance work. If you are not beat after this, you are not lifting enough weight. If you are not going to lift heavy, you don’t need to lift at all, the pool with provide you with plenty of high rep, low resistance strength training. Lifting everyday is too much. You should not be able to lift every day and add weight every day. REST. If you can nap after morning practice that is great. Otherwise you might need 9 or 10 hours of sleep every night to recover from all the lifting and swimming. The swimming advice you have already gotten is good. Working hard in the pool is more important then weights. The most important work you can do outside of the pool is make sure you body recovers as much as possible so you can kill it in the pool every practice. Weight lifting will play a very small role in you success at this point, so no need to worry about it too much. If you are not rail thin, then you need to look at the quality of the food you are eating. Chocolate cookie and sweetened lard sandwiches, aka oreos, are not what you want to be eating. If you have questions about nutrition ask.

Pwolf66 has some good ideas. i think that the goal time you have set is too fast for this year.

I have read through many nice suggestions, but I would add this, you need to discuss this with your coach. Write down what your goals are, develop a plan to achieve them, both commit to each other. The reason I say you need to discuss this with your coach is, just taking the advice of this forum may or may not help you. I say this because I read lifting weights four times a week, and you are 14. You need to make sure you are on a weight lifting program designed for swimmers. I played division 1 college football, and I didn't start lifting weights until I was almost 16. You need to grow, eat, work on technique, good work habits, and school work. The body development will come in time. Running, lifting, and swimming will make you tired, especially if you are on your own program, and not something designed to properly taper, meet certain goals be certain dates, and work in conjunction with your age and your athletic goals. I say this because I have spent many hours in the gym lifting, and I have battled knowing when to cut back on weights during season, or for big games. It is tough, especially when you are first starting out, because you never want to lift less weight then you did the time before. You always want to be improving, but there are other factors that may affect this. I highly recommend you speak with your coach and develop a plan. You are 14, your muscles will develop, so be patient with it, and don't lose focus with just benching and curling (like I did in high school). Worry about technique and attitude, so when your body puts on the muscle, you know how to properly leverage it.

Train like a sprinter. Fast swimming in workout must be accompanied by lots of recovery so you can do the next repeat at race pace. If you were in Masters, you'd see how often this philosophy is not used.