Please, help my butterfly stroke!!!

Nice rhythm. Breathing seems ok (although little late timing-wise). 33 something for your age group is very good. First thing that strikes me is that you seem to have tried to exit little further than some of your competitors (by extending the underwater dolphin kick) but some still managed to end up in front of you at first 12.5 Make sure by testing all this with your coach that your underwater dolphin kick is actually faster than your swim pace over 50m. If it's not the case then you should exit earlier and start swimming right away. I (myself) am not as fast underwater (at this point) than I am when swimming. I can lower the 25m under 15s swimming, but not underwater kicking. So I will make no attempt to mimic Micheal Phelps. Soon after the dive you see me exiting to get to my race pace as early as possible. The second thing that strikes me is that your first kick doesn't seem very strong. Like Speedo smartly pointed out, upon your arm entry, you'd benefit from a more powerful first kick. Speaking of arm entry, you seem to be generating little more drag than you should. I know, during a 50m, it's impossible not to splash or create drag but in your case, I donno, this phase seem to be your weakest. Poor first kick along with no glide forward and a lot of drag.... I am unsure as to which of these 3 problems is giving me the impression that you're loose speed there, probably a combination of the 3. Note that your training slower pace stroke might not reveal these weaknesses as well as your 50m race pace. If you want to correct these aspects, practice them slow but don't forget to practice and test them at full speed too (we often make the mistake of not swimming at full race pace often enough)

Some observations: 1) Looks like your body is very rigid throughout the whole swim. 2) Your lower back looks very rigid, seems like it should flex/bend more easily. 3) Arm recovery looks stiff as well, and it seems that they are coming out of the water way too high. If you can lower the arms to just barely clear the surface it should result in less energy being spent. 4) Undulation looks a bit excessive, if you can flatten your body dolphin out more (think of sending your body forward, not up and down), that should help smooth out your stroke. Looks like you've got the timing down fairly well, and this seems to be the biggest sticking point for butterfly. My overall summary might be to say your swim should look "more relaxed," it should look more fluid. Faster posters will probably offer up a better analysis. Good luck. :banana:

You have a nice butterfly. The 2 big problems I see are that you are not extending your arms enough on entry, and you are not getting any benefit from your kick. You have a very similar stroke to mine, so these 2 issues jumped out at me. Work on a stronger, deeper kick and extend your arms out in front of you- you are losing speed every time your arms re-enter the water. I hope this helps- there are many good butterflyers on this site that should be able to provide more info.

Ok, thank you very much, to everybody ... your replies make me very happy. I think everyone has found some real flaws swim, the recovery is high, the forward extension is limited and thus the attack is not very advanced and I haven't a good legs moviment (sure not power). So I think understand my big problem: many times in training when swim butterfly I start with one lateral arm on one side and then resumes with 2 arms, in this case I feel the weight shifted forward, the arms entry and extended immediately and note a lowest recovery and a legs more responsive. When I start to the block, I dont know why, but the stroke becomes more relaxed and less effective. Why??? Can be a problem of exit alignment (streamline), posture or body strong (abdominal)??? Thank Easy

Why??? Can be a problem of exit alignment (streamline), posture or body strong (abdominal)??? I am not entirely sure, and it's a combination of few things (like it's often the case), but to me, the dominant issue may be a timing issue. Timing of the arm entry relative to first kick (or vice versa). Look closely at these guys here also performing a 50m butterfly (short course meter I think). Look especially for the swimmer in first lane: YouTube - butterfly 50 swimming technique performance 25 seconds You may notice that when the **hands** enter the water, his body is already in a diving position. He already went over the wave and is therefore swimming downhill upon the arm entry. This combined with a powerful first kick gives this impression that he achieves great speed at this point in the stroke. Also, this guy is probably booking the 50 in 25s, and he is creating less splash than you (less drag as well). Now back to you. I isolated 3 pictures to better illustrate my comment. The image quality is very poor therefore I did draw a red line over your body so that you could better see what I mean. pic20.picturetrail.com/.../376583032.jpg pic20.picturetrail.com/.../376583031.jpg pic20.picturetrail.com/.../376583031.jpg Notice how these red lines are always oriented upward. Upon hand entry, your body should be at least parallel to the surface, or even getting into a downward (swimming downhill) position. If the body is aligned upward upon hand entry, you fall flat and make splash and drag. You should try to feel that you *fly over* this wave. Right now, you fall flat on it instead of moving over it to dive upon arm entry. So it could be a timing issue (arm entry relative to first kick) or your second kick isn't propulsive enough to allow you to fly over the wave, or a combination. Look at our model for today (picture link below). His body is parallel to the surface and the hands are not entered yet (no splash in the front) although lower arm are entering at that point. He is completing first kick, very deep and powerful. Body parallel is moving over the wave. He's touching it with his belly of course but upon entry, he's going to be in a downhill position and he'll still benefit from forward thrust provided by the first kick (deep and powerful). pic20.picturetrail.com/.../376583786.jpg Our model isn't the only BF swimmer doing this. We all have the mental image of good butterfly swimmers, underwater view. These guys have their head deep (after hands entry). Their nose/head/upper body is really pointing down steep angle and the hands are still catching. The hands are higher than the head. Think about it. Breathing must be real quick. You have to breathe over the wave then dive immediately. Recovery (and what follows including hand entry) should be tiny bit late relative to this. Anyway, you understand what I mean. Fly over the wave because if you fall flat on it (body sometimes aligned upward), you splash and loose some forward momentum. Hope that helps.

Can't tell much, other than you're too vertical and arms are too high. We need some under water video. Good luck

Uau, great analisys… all that help me... I know this video, is one of my prefered…but I have a double age and more of this young swimmer, I have begin to swim 4 years ago, I’m not so strong and I have a limitated flexibiliti of this swimmers, but... I want improve my butterfly. I have understand what you mean and I think is the really mistake that consequently causes other mistakes. I want repeat that, when I start to swim in training with one first single lateral arm and after double, I feel a exact body position and coordination : The recovery single arm and after double is low the body position is flat near the surface of the water and the first kick down my body and push forward the body at the same time I cick, the arms expand the catch is very high, at the high of neck and not at the lower of the body and prepare the second kick the arms make a “S” underwater, in race go staright the recovery is relaxed with palm turned down fall in the water is better and so the body position is not vertical But in race I feel that this is delayed and do not understand how to improve... The problem may be the first strokes after the breakdown, exactly the first catch??? Often I make the drill to feel the water, I paddle with arm in front... There are a drill or all other thing to do to correct this defect??? Sorry my no good english. Thank. Easy

There are a drill or all other thing to do to correct this defect??? Well there's a drill that may help you performing better at race pace, and it's to do more swim at this intensity. Doing too little work at race pace is a mistake we often commit. Make sure you include more 12.5 / 25m at full speed. Time this, count the number of strokes, and ideally get filmed (clip) once in a while. Your problem seems to be simple after all. Do more swim at race pace and your technique will improve at this speed.

Ok Solarenergy, I think it is a great truth!!! I have the same problem in freestyle, but this morning I did a race in 50 free and I tried several times in heating the start plus 12'5/25 meters full speed, or flip turn, and 12,5 full speed, etc ... The race was a good swim, (well for me...29,10) Thankyou for the suggestions!!! Easy

29.3 FreeStyle suggests a time under 32.0 for your 50m Butterfly. Keep nailing until you get there!!