I have the lofty goal of being able to go 50-100 LCM fly without toys. I can currently go about 25 yards. Can anyone help me devise a plan day by day of what to do to strengthen my shoulders/body enough to be able to do this? I do have fairly good rhythm - I used to race the 200 fly as a kid & can still kick fly well, and of course, I am most impressive when I wear my little zoomers - but even with zoomers, my arms start to die, and then I run out of breath around 37.5 meters. Any great ideas out there? Thanks!
Parents
Former Member
Based on my recent weeks of working up to the 200 fly, I have the following offerings:
1. Make sure you are kicking from the chest down. Starting small with fins, 25 at a time and gradually working up to 200m/yd continuous, then doing it without fins really helped my fly when I started back at it last year. Although if you have a good kick already this might be redundant advice.
2. Like Orca said - glide with your arms outstretched at the end of the recovery to keep the stroke long.
3. Keep up the forward movement when you breathe. I think I actually used to stop dead for a split second!
4. Completely empty your lungs of air before breathing. I only realised I wasn't always doing this a couple of weeks ago, and that I was getting all short of breath and tight in my chest becasue my lungs were still full and I was trying to breathe more air in. I mainly breathe every 2, but am switching to a 2,1,1, pattern for the 2nd half of the 200 so I can keep up the speed. However if I start out with breathing like this, I somehow end up short of breath, even though I'm breathing more often - go figure!
5. Build up gradually 25s, then 50s, then 75s, then 100s. I actually did these on a really long interval, so I could complete the total set, and each week I kept the total distance the same (eg 8 x 50 for a couple of weeks, then 6 x 75, then 4 x 100)
6. Don't worry about how fast you do it, warm up well beforehand and relax.
It was a huge shock to go from swimming SCY to LCM a few weeks ago, I just had to stretch it out and wait for the end of the pool.
Based on my recent weeks of working up to the 200 fly, I have the following offerings:
1. Make sure you are kicking from the chest down. Starting small with fins, 25 at a time and gradually working up to 200m/yd continuous, then doing it without fins really helped my fly when I started back at it last year. Although if you have a good kick already this might be redundant advice.
2. Like Orca said - glide with your arms outstretched at the end of the recovery to keep the stroke long.
3. Keep up the forward movement when you breathe. I think I actually used to stop dead for a split second!
4. Completely empty your lungs of air before breathing. I only realised I wasn't always doing this a couple of weeks ago, and that I was getting all short of breath and tight in my chest becasue my lungs were still full and I was trying to breathe more air in. I mainly breathe every 2, but am switching to a 2,1,1, pattern for the 2nd half of the 200 so I can keep up the speed. However if I start out with breathing like this, I somehow end up short of breath, even though I'm breathing more often - go figure!
5. Build up gradually 25s, then 50s, then 75s, then 100s. I actually did these on a really long interval, so I could complete the total set, and each week I kept the total distance the same (eg 8 x 50 for a couple of weeks, then 6 x 75, then 4 x 100)
6. Don't worry about how fast you do it, warm up well beforehand and relax.
It was a huge shock to go from swimming SCY to LCM a few weeks ago, I just had to stretch it out and wait for the end of the pool.
