Last summer I got some video of various swimmers at a club in Montreal and I put together some videos that compare two swimmers' butterfly timing:
Above water comparison:
YouTube- Butterfly Stroke Comparison
Below water comparison:
YouTube- Underwater Comparison Of Butterfly Strokes
Above and below of just the lower swimmer:
YouTube- Alfonso Split Screen Butterfly
I wrote some thoughts about the differences in timing here:
mymsc.ca/.../butterfly_stroke_timing
In addition to the timing there are some other issues like kicking from the knee, but I am interested in what approach people would suggest to help this swimmer improve his stroke, whether it be an approach to changing his timing or something else.
I've got a couple swimmers in my club that have similar timing issues and are having a hard time changing.
Thanks in advance for any suggestions!
I swam the open swim today along with one of my swimmers who has been struggling with timing (he basically was doing both kicks before catching) and he gave the "zero-kick" fly a try and it was magic! He was wearing fins too but he had a nice flowing stroke totally unlike his usual stroke. He still has a pause out front but man what a difference! It will be interesting to see what it looks like when he tries it without fins, but it is already a huge improvement on what he used to do with fins so I'll keep my fingers crossed!
Thanks for the suggestion Bill!
I worked on this myself, along with trying to eliminate the pause and I do much better with a relatively passive kick (letting it flow out of the stroke). I'm looking forward to trying this with some more of my swimmers.
You welcome Red60, I'm certainly getting a lot out of the thread too!
Glad that worked for you, Lindsay. The fins give a nice big platform to push off of to set up the pull, and slow down an overkick, so they work well with the no kick drill. The feeling should translate pretty directly to the stroke without fins, and you can always go back and forth as necessary.
I swam the open swim today along with one of my swimmers who has been struggling with timing (he basically was doing both kicks before catching) and he gave the "zero-kick" fly a try and it was magic! He was wearing fins too but he had a nice flowing stroke totally unlike his usual stroke. He still has a pause out front but man what a difference! It will be interesting to see what it looks like when he tries it without fins, but it is already a huge improvement on what he used to do with fins so I'll keep my fingers crossed!
Thanks for the suggestion Bill!
I worked on this myself, along with trying to eliminate the pause and I do much better with a relatively passive kick (letting it flow out of the stroke). I'm looking forward to trying this with some more of my swimmers.
You welcome Red60, I'm certainly getting a lot out of the thread too!
Glad that worked for you, Lindsay. The fins give a nice big platform to push off of to set up the pull, and slow down an overkick, so they work well with the no kick drill. The feeling should translate pretty directly to the stroke without fins, and you can always go back and forth as necessary.
