I personally never do drills that focus on a part of a full stroke, such as kicking alone, or one-hand stroke, etc. etc. If I want to correct/improve a certain aspect of the stroke, I do so in full stroke. How many out there share my opinion that separate drills are unnecessary, or even not helpful?
Wow. Every great coach I ever had broke down our strokes and did drills with us on a regular basis (for each stroke, each turn, starts, finishes). I find drills invaluable when teaching non-swimmers how to do the stroke correctly. The best drill EVER, IMHO, as far as teaching non-swimmers to lengthen their freestyle and rotate is kicking on the side. As I understand it, just about every elite swimmer does drill work. I can't see how one can argue that drills aren't valuable and have solid evidence to back that up.
Having said that, though, I'm not as good about doing drills myself now that I'm pressed for time and swimming on my own. If I got more serious about my swimming, though, I'd definitely be drilling to fix a lot of things...
Wow. Every great coach I ever had broke down our strokes and did drills with us on a regular basis (for each stroke, each turn, starts, finishes). I find drills invaluable when teaching non-swimmers how to do the stroke correctly. The best drill EVER, IMHO, as far as teaching non-swimmers to lengthen their freestyle and rotate is kicking on the side. As I understand it, just about every elite swimmer does drill work. I can't see how one can argue that drills aren't valuable and have solid evidence to back that up.
Having said that, though, I'm not as good about doing drills myself now that I'm pressed for time and swimming on my own. If I got more serious about my swimming, though, I'd definitely be drilling to fix a lot of things...
