If you come from an older generation of swimmers you may have been taught a technique called the ‘S-Pull’. This is a swim form developed in the 1970s and saw use for a couple decades in the competitive circuit. The goal of the S-Pull was to increase the length of each pull using an S shape: Beginning the stroke with the thumb down, sweeping outwards, and then sweeping back in by the hips. If you’re having a hard time visualizing this, imagine the movement your arm makes when putting on and taking off a towel. The two are basically the same.
However, the technique was created without taking into account the rolling of the body it generates. Also, next to the modern vertical or ‘I-Pull’ techniques, the S Pull has many drawbacks:
· Forcing your palms outwards while entering the water can cause shoulder injuries.
· Your ability to reach further to grab a still anchor point is diminished.
· The path of a swimmer’s hands is arched, pushing water partly sideways rather than straight back, losing efficiency.
So if you’re still using the S-Pull try switching to a straighter form. You want to lengthen your reach so you can anchor in non-moving water, keeping your elbows up, without a small arch. Your hands should only be tilted 45° and kept closed. And when flutter-kicking remember to use your whole leg, with your feet barely breaking the surface, keeping your core contracted to keep your hips from rocking.
Former Member
Welcome to the sport of swimming.
I'm intrigued by folks who discover swimming, join a forum, and include a coaching tip in their first post.
You must have had quite a good first year of swimming.
How do you know the poster is new to swimming or in the first year? The "newbie" and number of posts only refer to amount of time on the forum, not the amount of time in the sport.
I took a look at the website he pasted this from and clicked the "About" tab.
I suppose I should have just ignored it and gone about my business. Sorry.
Where did you find a website? I was seriously asking because in the post it didn't mention anything about his years of experience in the sport.
Shouldn't there should be no pull pattern at all?
The hand should exit the water very close to where it entered.
Maybe from a fixed reference frame, but from your reference frame in the water clearly your arm and hand are moving in relation to the rest of your body, so, yes, there is a pull pattern.
I think it was Counsilman who first noticed that for good swimmers the hand enters the water and exits at nearly the same place but I think this is a little deceptive. Sure it's nice to think about anchoring your hands, but in reality I'm sure the kick has a lot to do with where you hand enters and exits. I'll bet without a kick your hand would be exiting considerably behind where it entered.
It is my opinion that I see many different types of pulls at the elite level. They all seem to have one thing in common....a high elbow. I did see swimmers hands entering the water with palms out as well as down and both close to the center line as well as shoulder width in the finals of the 1500 free in Beijing. I think you do what gets you down the pool the fastest.
The person I tried to emulate the most at my pool was old school thumbs down palms out and he had what I thought was a traditional S pull. Having said that, he was so darn fast and he had such tremendous DPS, I won't critisize S-pull.
steve, I tend to agree that with elite swimmers yes, but for the rest of us, perhaps not? Maybe time lapsed photos could show us what actually happens, especially the differences between the elites and non elites? There are swimmers who don't kick at all that are very fast and it would be interesting to watch time lapsed photos of their stroke.
never did use it. had one coach try to get me to switch to it, but I'd loose streamline everytime I tried.
now I just keep the pull wide as I can. feels better on the shoulders.
This is like that question about whether or not your heels touch the wall on flipturns. I'd have to pay attention to figure it out. (And mostly I wouldn't care.)
That thread was funny. I was like you, Chris. I really had no idea whether my heels touched on turns. When I actually thought about it in the pool I realized that no only do they NOT touch, I couldn't even get them to touch when I tried!
Back on topic, I don't think about anything other than a good catch and then pulling straight back. I don't know what actually happens.
I fight the urge to S-pull, but I'm sure my technique suffers. Then again, when I started swimming there were only 104 elements in the Periodic Table...
