I'm a rookie in the pool, and am surprised that keeping one's weight down appears to be less important than I thought. After decades of running with the knowledge that every pound over my running weight added 20 secs to my p/m pace, am I ok being a little chunky? I do aspire to be competitive in my age class. Thanks, Steve
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Former Member
The body floats but swimming is like climbing a horizontal ladder. Extra weight is a HUGE issue. You must pull harder due to the extra mass. Pulling harder can create more slip for a fixed hand/forearm size.
Carry a surfboard into the ocean, then paddle out. Huge weight difference, but you should be able to paddle yourself on that big heavy surfboard pretty fast.
Swimming is more about drag and thus surface area when it comes to buoyant materials. Weight matters, but not as much as being shaped like a cube vs a speed boat.
I am really just disagreeing with the use of HUGE :)
The body floats but swimming is like climbing a horizontal ladder. Extra weight is a HUGE issue. You must pull harder due to the extra mass. Pulling harder can create more slip for a fixed hand/forearm size.
Carry a surfboard into the ocean, then paddle out. Huge weight difference, but you should be able to paddle yourself on that big heavy surfboard pretty fast.
Swimming is more about drag and thus surface area when it comes to buoyant materials. Weight matters, but not as much as being shaped like a cube vs a speed boat.
I am really just disagreeing with the use of HUGE :)
