Mine is a strictly 70s-era breaststroke, pretty flat, shoulders mostly stay in the water. My coach says I should be getting up (much) higher, though my initial thought was that energy devoted to going UP rather than FORWARD seems wasted.
But Maglischo is pretty convincing that the wave-style breaststroke is better and it certainly seems like the best breaststrokers nowadays all use this stroke.
So what drills or other means are out there to help modernize this old dog's breaststroke? Has anyone else out here made a successful transition and care to share what helped?
Steve,
I started my evolution from the 70s' like technique to the modern version (wave motion) a month ago and have already achieved a visible improvement in speed.
A few things that I learned:
1. You try to minimize both arms and legs recovery phase time. You do "fold - unfold" quickly. You accelerate your arms pull into recovery phase.
2. You kick "into your back" that allows you to direct your kick momentum and body wave motion forward
Kitajima does #1 and #2 really well:
YouTube- *** Kitajima gliding
3. To make my pull faster I should have reduced its width sizeably.
4. In implementing this modern *** technique I was advised to focus on DPS with 3 sec glide in a steamlined position. Then reduce the glide time gradually during the season, so in a few months you should be able to swim fast with a 0,2 sec glide.
Dmitri
Good points.Re: the width of the pull:that is something very individual that you have to play with.In general wider gives more power,but is slower to complete.Strong upperbody swimmers in general will want a wider pull to maximize their strength,but not at the expense of their tempo.A good breaststroke is all about tempo.I used to have 3 fairly different strokes for 50,100 and 200.Now it is as close to the same as I can get for all three with the difference being how long I"ride the glide".
Steve,
I started my evolution from the 70s' like technique to the modern version (wave motion) a month ago and have already achieved a visible improvement in speed.
A few things that I learned:
1. You try to minimize both arms and legs recovery phase time. You do "fold - unfold" quickly. You accelerate your arms pull into recovery phase.
2. You kick "into your back" that allows you to direct your kick momentum and body wave motion forward
Kitajima does #1 and #2 really well:
YouTube- *** Kitajima gliding
3. To make my pull faster I should have reduced its width sizeably.
4. In implementing this modern *** technique I was advised to focus on DPS with 3 sec glide in a steamlined position. Then reduce the glide time gradually during the season, so in a few months you should be able to swim fast with a 0,2 sec glide.
Dmitri
Good points.Re: the width of the pull:that is something very individual that you have to play with.In general wider gives more power,but is slower to complete.Strong upperbody swimmers in general will want a wider pull to maximize their strength,but not at the expense of their tempo.A good breaststroke is all about tempo.I used to have 3 fairly different strokes for 50,100 and 200.Now it is as close to the same as I can get for all three with the difference being how long I"ride the glide".
