Asking for feedback on my breaststroke arm technique

You would be better served with a video shot from the side, as this will show your arm pull more clearly. Also, it seems as though you are taking a relatively high number of strokes. I take 5-6 for 25y (when I use an u/w pull-down).

I'm not a breaststroker but it looks nice and snappy to me. I can't wait to read replies and get some hints. Thanks! You would be better served with a video shot from the side, as this will show your arm pull more clearly. Also, it seems as though you are taking a relatively high number of strokes. I take 5-6 for 25y (when I use an u/w pull-down). Thanks, I'll try to get another angle sometime :) About the stroke count: yeah, even though this is meters and not yards my stroke count was higher than usual. I think that was focusing too much on the arms for the video and as a result my kick was weaker than usual... :bitching:

I can't be sure looking from the front,but it looks like maybe you aren't really getting into EVF and are leading with your elbows a little.A side view would be better(underwater even better.)

Try holding that glide a bit longer. YouTube- Kosuke Kitajima 100m Breaststroke Under Water Camera

I'm not a breaststroker but it looks nice and snappy to me. I can't wait to read replies and get some hints.

Hard to tell much from the front over water... Your head looks very still and not too much wasted motion with the neck and shoulders. I can't see much of how your head is following your shoulders or vice versa. What I sense is that you are relying too much on your pull and not your hips/legs...which is why you don't have much of a glide to use the power from your undulation/kick. Your undulation should be very much the same as butterfly. The pressing of your shoulders down and forward and your hips following will create a wave that will really make a difference. Your hands look a bit loose too. I see many breaststrokers now concentrating so much on the recovery, that they forget that this is just to get their hands/forearms back into position to catch. What does your coach say?

Hey, I've been trying to perfect my breaststroke arm techique. I shot this video of me swimming at moderate speed a few days ago and was wondering what you guys think of my progress so far: Breaststroke arm technique, July 2010 on Vimeo and a higher quality version available for download (file is 6,7MB): localhostr.com/.../brst.mp4 I was not in my best shape at the time, but I don't think my usual stroke is very different from the one in the video. Thanks! Try and get a little forward tilt of your head. I see that you keep your head almost straight up and down the whole time. You want to focus your eyes on the bottom of the pool about 3-4 feet in front of you the whole time. That helps to promote better body position.

Thanks guys! In particular to Zulu, for such an insightful post. I'm definitely going to try to shoot that side-view video soon. Hard to tell much from the front over water... Your head looks very still and not too much wasted motion with the neck and shoulders. I can't see much of how your head is following your shoulders or vice versa. What I sense is that you are relying too much on your pull and not your hips/legs...which is why you don't have much of a glide to use the power from your undulation/kick. Your undulation should be very much the same as butterfly. The pressing of your shoulders down and forward and your hips following will create a wave that will really make a difference. Your hands look a bit loose too. I see many breaststrokers now concentrating so much on the recovery, that they forget that this is just to get their hands/forearms back into position to catch. What does your coach say? I think that even without watching my breaststroke from a proper angle your critique was spot-on. I have always felt that when I finish my pull I pretty much stop moving and kill my glide. In other words, I don't really "project" my body to the water: I just fall into it. I will definitely look into involving the shoulders and hips more to fix this. Regarding the hands: what you are basically saying is that I should have a faster recovery, right? Currently training without a coach ;) Thank you very much once again. Cheers :chug: