Freestyle body rotation/getting power from the hips

I think that means when you rotate your hands/arms are in a stronger position to propel you forward.

Rotation of the hips is the key for me. I get a longer, more powerful stroke. I have been swimming distance well, but fall apart when sprinting. A substitute coach (age group experience) really helped me. He said to sprint, move your hips faster. That will increase the arm speed without "flailing." A video helped me with backstroke rotation - hips should rotate before the hand enters the water.

Power comes from two forces. The primary force is a drag force or pushing the water straight back. You can't keep a straight line backward because a vortex behind the hand reduces drag force, so the hand must move to and away from the midline of the body. Hip rotation is indeed important but it helps lift forces but it is a secondary force. Front quadrant, upper body, hip stroke, surfboard swimming, TI, EVF, and whatever, a coach who knows something about swimming will tell you that the fastest swimmers in the world share common denominators. Every world record holder doesn't drop their elbow, they have in one way or another, an early vertical forearm position (straighter or more bent but it's early none the less). Every world record holder gets in a streamlined position and uses their hips to release or finish their stroke (again to greater and lesser degrees). If you want to go fast you must follow certain rules. Get a good coach that knows something about stroke mechanics and try to improve upon those mechanics. Good Luck, Coach T.

When swimming free I like to think that I'm reaching for something under the couch that is just out of reach while rotating your hips. That is kind of how I visualize it at least. I like that image. Consider it stolen. -LBJ

You can't keep a straight line backward because a vortex behind the hand reduces drag force, so the hand must move to and away from the midline of the body. I suspect that simple geometry has more to do with this than vortexes. Consider the geometry of your shoulder, upper arm and elbow: simplify your shoulder to a universal joint fixed in space so that your upper arm can point off in any direction, the possible positions of your elbow are basically a sphere, or those parts of a sphere which aren't blocked by your body and range of motion limitations. You can't move your elbow in a straight line from over your head to by your side, the path will always be an arc. For your elbow to follow a straight line you would have to move your shoulder and body in unrealistic and clearly inefficient ways. If you consider your hand and forearm as one big paddle attached to your elbow there is no reason to believe that it would follow a straight line, it's just not mechanically feasible let alone efficient.

Power from the hips comes from perfectly timed rythm between your kick and your arm pull. Betsy is right, the rythm center is at the hips and it is this core connectivity that develops maximum efficiency and speed. Does this make sense?

I suspect that simple geometry has more to do with this than vortexes. Consider the geometry of your shoulder, upper arm and elbow: simplify your shoulder to a universal joint fixed in space so that your upper arm can point off in any direction, the possible positions of your elbow are basically a sphere, or those parts of a sphere which aren't blocked by your body and range of motion limitations. You can't move your elbow in a straight line from over your head to by your side, the path will always be an arc. For your elbow to follow a straight line you would have to move your shoulder and body in unrealistic and clearly inefficient ways. If you consider your hand and forearm as one big paddle attached to your elbow there is no reason to believe that it would follow a straight line, it's just not mechanically feasible let alone efficient. If it were simple geometry swimmers wouldn't have to consider the multiple relationships important to swimming speed. If you didn't have an elbow, forearm and hand the basic sphere analogy is correct but the hand can move in a straight line and some swimmers use that technique. The pulling pattern of the hand is critical for peak swimming performance. It is the pulling pattern and the force it generates that creates a key component to swimming speed. I think when swimmers are told that the hips generate power, they're being misled. I'm not saying that the movement of the hips isn't important, it is, but they work in concert with a number of factors. Here they are: The hand, the setting up of the hand into the water clearing the air behind it, a full extention that begins with the "setting-up" of the hand / forearm into an early vertical position, using effective drag forces at the end of the first quadrant and through the second quadrant of the stroke, during the second quadrant the hips help the hand produce lift forces as the hand move toward the midline and away from the midline (as the hand exits). Peak momentum in maintained as one hand releases (as it exits) while the other sets-up to establish optimum drag force as the cycle repeats itself. Tarzan had a freestyle stroke that looks different than today's fastest swimmer but even Johnny Weissmuller had the basic components mentioned above. Every front quadrant, EVF, hip generated, TI, distance, sprint, triathlete, master, world record holder who wants to get faster, needs to improve things from the list above (didn't include things like kick, aerobic, anareobic, strength and flexibility). George is fuming by now I lost my focus like a lot of swimmers when we reply to some of the threads (sorry Lindsay). Like the following unknown author said. "We are too busy mopping the floor to turn off the faucet."

When swimming free I like to think that I'm reaching for something under the couch that is just out of reach while rotating your hips. That is kind of how I visualize it at least. Cross Country skiing (certain techniques) on the Olympics reminds me a lot of swimming as well...although they don't really over extend on the reach.

Maybe an expert can chime in here but aren't there two major kinds of freestyle swimming - shoulder driven vs. hip driven - assuming you are rotating at all? (I'm a plower, so I'm not a free expert by any means - in fact, I have yet to figure out this stroke). So when I don't kick (2 beat or drag feet), my stroke is shoulder driven. When I kick hard (6 beat), it's more hip driven. But back to the poster's initial question, doesn't one need to learn to balance and *ride your rails* (swim on your side) in order to rotate in free? I personally like 6 kick switch or side glide drills for learning to swim more to one's side. Then, in order to switch efficiently from side to side, one must determine if they are a stronger puller (shoulder driven) or a stronger kicker (hip driven) and use it to their advantage. So that means that you will either use your shoulders or your kick to rotate from side to side. Anyway, this can get confusing. . . sorry to not be much help here. I'm sure others will join in the discussion.

First of all, I don't know if these concepts are directly related. But I finally got some coaching tips and realize that I am plowing through the water like I am swimming like I am stroking with my belly on a surfboard. I have learned to get the high elbow recovery and now I feel the rotation of my body, or at least the potential for it to rotate. So my question is, do I force my body to rotate more, or is this a natural consequence of doing other things correctly? I can especially feel it on my left/non-breathing side where I can force myself to over rotate beyond which I am doing. The power from the hips part, I was told I need to do that, but I have no idea how to execute it. One simple way to improve hip rotation is to point your belly button toward one wall, and then toward the other wall in training. This will give you 90 degrees of hip rotation to each side. Then when you race, it will drop down to 45-60 degrees, which will help your swimming. It's also a good idea to turn your hips fast. Tests conducted on our swimmers at Colorado Springs showed they doubled their peak hand force output in just five days after they increased the speed and range and advanced the timing of their hip rotation. One of the swimmers went on to win four Gold Medals at Atlanta; another won two.