The DQ thread got me thinking about swimming rules I'd like to see repealed. Here's my list:
15M rule on freestyle -- You're allowed to do virtually anything you want in a freestyle race provided you touch the walls, don't push off the bottom and don't pull on the lane lines. Why is going beyond 15 meters doing SDK not "freestyle?"
15M rule on backstroke -- Again, the rule seems arbitrary as I could go 15M underwater SDK, pop up and then kick the rest of the way still doing SDK on my back and be perfectly legal. What's so magical about 15M?
Dolphin kick off the wall on a breaststroke pullout -- just have the guts to DQ Kitajima back when he should've been DQd and this whole :worms:wouldn't have been opened.
Rollover backstroke turns -- go back to the bucket turn (touch on your back, turn, push off on your back) and you save a whole bunch of DQ hassles for swimmers & judges. Yeah, times will be way slower, but we banned tech suits, so clearly the swimming purists should be lined up behind this one.
Standup backstroke starts -- what's so magical about starting with your toes / feet in the water when we get to start with our feet out of the water on all other races? Let's stop the discrimination against backstrokers!
For the record, with the exception of #5, I would derive no speed benefit from any of the above rule changes as a competitor (I can't hold my breath in a race for 15M and my doplhin kick on the *** pullout is weak at best). As an S&T judge, though, all of these would make my life easier and, I believe (#5 possibly excepted), be more consistent with the overall rules for the strokes.
Well, the flags and the "T" are visual queues... there are no rule-specified set of flags or pool bottom markings at 15 meters (or 15 yards, if you would guess that for short course) for the underwater backstroking, flying, or reallly good breastroking swimmer to cue off of. So the underwater swimmer would have to "guess" based on SDK count for that course (meters or yards) and some appropriate factoring for how well one feels that day.
Not to say these additional visual queues couldn't be added... but for now...
Counting kicks is the way I do it. And it's 15m for all courses, yards or meters.
Counting kicks is the way I do it. And it's 15m for all courses, yards or meters.
Chris, agree... and that was my original thought/point when the 15m question first popped. Like you, I thought, well, it only makes sense to standardize across courses.
But as a backstroker, when asked about other visual queing and how it might relate if the distance was different based on lcm/scm/yds, I had to think harder when freestyle, fly and *** are taken into account. Thus the idea about bottom markings as well as flags.
Chris, agree... and that was my original thought/point when the 15m question first popped. Like you, I thought, well, it only makes sense to standardize across courses.
But, but, but ... 15 meters is 66% of a SCY pool or 60% of a SCM pool. In LCM it's only 30% of the pool. So, in SCM or SCY you swim no more than half as much backstroke as in LCM and the race is much more like an SDK race instead of a backstroke race. I'm no expert. How close to 15m to good swimmers get at the end of a 200yd race? I assume not as close as at the beginning.
And counting kicks makes it easy (and proves my point I think). You don't need a visual cue. Just kick the desired number of times and pop out. What am I missing?
Skip
But, but, but ... 15 meters is 66% of a SCY pool or 60% of a SCM pool. In LCM it's only 30% of the pool. So, in SCM or SCY you swim no more than half as much backstroke as in LCM and the race is much more like an SDK race instead of a backstroke race. I'm no expert. How close to 15m to good swimmers get at the end of a 200yd race? I assume not as close as at the beginning.
And counting kicks makes it easy (and proves my point I think). You don't need a visual cue. Just kick the desired number of times and pop out. What am I missing?
Skip
I think I'm in the minority here, but 15 m of SDK in a SCM or SCY seems like too much kicking and too little of the stroke at hand. SDKing is a great skill and I admire it, but it is a different skill. I'd rather us make a separate SDK event and leave the strokes as strokes.
I think I'm in the minority here, but 15 m of SDK in a SCM or SCY seems like too much kicking and too little of the stroke at hand. SDKing is a great skill and I admire it, but it is a different skill. I'd rather us make a separate SDK event and leave the strokes as strokes.
Kicking is part of swimming.
Kicking is part of swimming.
I never said it wasn't part of swimming.... you'll note that I said that I think it should be a separate event, meaning, a separate SWIMMING event. I just think the skill of, for example, swimming backstroke, is different from the skill of SDKing, and that the events should be separated. Again, I recognize that I probably have the minority view here.
I just think the skill of, for example, swimming backstroke, is different from the skill of SDKing, and that the events should be separated.
Backstroke is anything you want it to be as long as you are on your back. So SDK on your back *is* backstroke. There is no distinction between the two.
Getting rid of the 15m rule would not turn every event into an underwater contest. It would have a big effect on 50s, except the 50 free for most people (ever notice that the fastest sprinters pop right up on the start?).
If there were no 15m rule right now, my kicking strategy in (say) the 100 back or 100 fly would be unchanged except for perhaps 1-2 more kicks off the start. And greater ease of mind knowing I won't be DQ'd on the start.
Maybe it would be different for the young studs out there, but I don't think it would be greatly different. Yes, SDK is faster than every stroke except sprint free, but you pay a price for it in oxygen debt. There is a compromise, and it generally less than 15m.
You don't see even the elites go to 15m on every turn in every event, do you?
Counting kicks is about the only reliable way to make sure you don't run afoul of the 15m rule, since not all lane lines have a different colored disk for the 15 mark. And even that's hard to see if your head is in line with your spine underwater. And that's when your goggles don't leak.
If you see the colored disk when you're underwater, you've gone too far... :)
Backstroke is anything you want it to be as long as you are on your back. So SDK on your back *is* backstroke. There is no distinction between the two.
It seems to me as though you are quibbling. Clearly, according to the current rules, SDK on your back is not backstroke, or else you could do it for the whole length of the pool. Or, to put it another way -- there is the SDKing that you can do during the first 15m of backstroke, and then there is the stuff you can do for the rest of the length. Call that second part whatever you like, but I'd like to see us return to a focus on that. You might disagree with me -- fine. Again, I am sure that most people disagree with me. But don't try to define my suggestion out of existence. It's not a very polite way to argue.
Totally agree on this. I hated that I had to start doing the fly kick off of each wall for breaststroke. I think that Hansen wished that the officials would have DQed whats his face back in 04.
I didn't think you HAD to do the fly kicks, I was under the assumption that you COULD do them. I didn't do them when I swam at my LCM meet this past summer, and I wasn't DQ'd (never been DQ'd, but I've only swum in a handful of meets).
With all the talk about being DQ'd, for someone unfamiliar with doing fly kicks on ***, I just didn't want to risk anything.
