The Backstroke Lane

After swimming backstroke for one year, diligently working on core for the last four months, and increasing dolphin practice for the last 3 months, I am finally starting to get a little bit comfortable with dolphins off the wall. How do you decide how many dolphins to use off each wall in each event? When to use flutter instead? Right now I can put maybe six or eight dolphins off the start and turn in the 50, five off the start and first two turns in the 100 (only two on the last turn, alas), and like zero off all walls in the 200. It seems to me a quite a complicated tradeoff between oxygen, legs, and speed of dolphins at various levels of tiredness, not to mention other factors. Right now it doesn't seem to matter whether or not I use dolphins in a meet, the times come out pretty much the same. However, I think my kick will improve. Unfortunately I don't have a coach to time 12.5 yard sprints under various conditions. What's the best way, or even a good way, to systematically think about dolphins? Yes, the trade-off is complicated. First of all: is your all-out dolphin kick faster than your swim? If so then, in a 50 at least, you want to be under the water as much as possible (15m off both walls if you can). How many you take for the 100 and 200 will depend on your conditioning and practice. You talk about working on core and dolphin kicks for months...I've worked on them for many years and am still finding ways to improve. It is a long process, though initial improvement should come rapidly. You need to work on: -- technique. The proper amplitude for you, and maintaining a very tight and narrow streamline in your upper body. Your head should be *between* your arms, which are very very tight. Stretch to be a long shape underwater; and from your chest up you should be rigid. Lead with your hips in your kicking; ankles need to be very flexible (work on this separately if necessary). You can use fins to work on the proper streamline position: the increased speed with the fins will hopefully make small improvements in streamline more noticeable. -- kicking conditioning/strength. Do 25 all-out sprints (ideally no-breath "shooters" if you can), as well as 50s, 75s and 100s very fast, with plenty of recovery between. Don't just do 25s and 50s, you need to work on the longer distances too. Push it as far as you can underwater on each lap -- even past the 15m mark, if you are able. -- on backstroke sets, gradually increase the number of kicks you do off the walls. You need to have a minimum number of kicks off EVERY wall, no matter how tired you are. (I never take fewer than 6, for example, not even in warmup.) -- you need to have a realistic "kicking goal plan" for your races. For example: 5 kicks off every wall in the 100, 3 kicks off every wall in the 200. Do race-intensity 100s and 200s in practice using this plan. Get plenty of rest between repeats and make it your goal to stick to your kicking plan, even at the expense of swimming speed if necessary. Eventually, your legs will be "toughened up" enough that you won't be sacrificing swimming speed...and then add a kick to each wall and start over. Just my $0.02, anyway; good luck.

After swimming backstroke for one year, diligently working on core for the last four months, and increasing dolphin practice for the last 3 months, I am finally starting to get a little bit comfortable with dolphins off the wall. How do you decide how many dolphins to use off each wall in each event? When to use flutter instead? Right now I can put maybe six or eight dolphins off the start and turn in the 50, five off the start and first two turns in the 100 (only two on the last turn, alas), and like zero off all walls in the 200. It seems to me a quite a complicated tradeoff between oxygen, legs, and speed of dolphins at various levels of tiredness, not to mention other factors. Right now it doesn't seem to matter whether or not I use dolphins in a meet, the times come out pretty much the same. However, I think my kick will improve. Unfortunately I don't have a coach to time 12.5 yard sprints under various conditions. What's the best way, or even a good way, to systematically think about dolphins? Yes, the trade-off is complicated. First of all: is your all-out dolphin kick faster than your swim? If so then, in a 50 at least, you want to be under the water as much as possible (15m off both walls if you can). How many you take for the 100 and 200 will depend on your conditioning and practice. You talk about working on core and dolphin kicks for months...I've worked on them for many years and am still finding ways to improve. It is a long process, though initial improvement should come rapidly. You need to work on: -- technique. The proper amplitude for you, and maintaining a very tight and narrow streamline in your upper body. Your head should be *between* your arms, which are very very tight. Stretch to be a long shape underwater; and from your chest up you should be rigid. Lead with your hips in your kicking; ankles need to be very flexible (work on this separately if necessary). You can use fins to work on the proper streamline position: the increased speed with the fins will hopefully make small improvements in streamline more noticeable. -- kicking conditioning/strength. Do 25 all-out sprints (ideally no-breath "shooters" if you can), as well as 50s, 75s and 100s very fast, with plenty of recovery between. Don't just do 25s and 50s, you need to work on the longer distances too. Push it as far as you can underwater on each lap -- even past the 15m mark, if you are able. -- on backstroke sets, gradually increase the number of kicks you do off the walls. You need to have a minimum number of kicks off EVERY wall, no matter how tired you are. (I never take fewer than 6, for example, not even in warmup.) -- you need to have a realistic "kicking goal plan" for your races. For example: 5 kicks off every wall in the 100, 3 kicks off every wall in the 200. Do race-intensity 100s and 200s in practice using this plan. Get plenty of rest between repeats and make it your goal to stick to your kicking plan, even at the expense of swimming speed if necessary. Eventually, your legs will be "toughened up" enough that you won't be sacrificing swimming speed...and then add a kick to each wall and start over. Just my $0.02, anyway; good luck.