After recognizing that my stroke is much longer than most OWS, I decided to poke around and see if stroke was different for OW as opposed to swimming in a pool. I found this (There is a part 2 if you click on the channel and scroll down the right side):
YouTube - Swim Smooth: What Is An Efficient Freestyle Stroke? Part 1
I would love to get reactions. I know that when I quicken my stroke rate and shorten my stroke I seem to fatigue much more quickly. However, this could be due to not pursuing this long enough to re-establish breathing patterns. (When I concentrate on my stroke, I tend to hold my breath without realizing it).
I do know that while my per 100 pace is slowly improving with more speed work in my work outs, it has dropped now where near what it used to be 20 years ago.
Therefore, he says, "Efficiency in the water cannot be measured by the number of strokes you take per length, by itself. That would be a gross oversimplification of the freestyle stroke."
Keep in mind who we are talking about and possibly who we are talking t
Or as I like to say, "how is what these people are saying correct?"
In my triathlon class it is uncanny the degree to which strokes per length correlates with speed. Having seen it for years I am still sometimes very surprised. The slowest folks are at 22 to 27 strokes per length (25 yards), the next slowest are in the 19 to 22 range. The getting there folks are in the 16 to 19 range and the fastest are 13 to 16.
Also that range will cover 2,000 paces of 2:25 per 100 down to 1:12 per 100.
Across such a large variation, yes you will see the big differences. However, in studies looking at say, the final 8 swimmers at world championships there does not seem to be a relation between stroke count and speed. But also the speeds represented are very close together.
Correlations on tightly grouped data are not obvious and sometimes don't show up.
To that point, in my faster group of masters swimmers we have some people at 19 or 20, some at 14 and they swim roughly the same speed.
Therefore, he says, "Efficiency in the water cannot be measured by the number of strokes you take per length, by itself. That would be a gross oversimplification of the freestyle stroke."
Keep in mind who we are talking about and possibly who we are talking t
Or as I like to say, "how is what these people are saying correct?"
In my triathlon class it is uncanny the degree to which strokes per length correlates with speed. Having seen it for years I am still sometimes very surprised. The slowest folks are at 22 to 27 strokes per length (25 yards), the next slowest are in the 19 to 22 range. The getting there folks are in the 16 to 19 range and the fastest are 13 to 16.
Also that range will cover 2,000 paces of 2:25 per 100 down to 1:12 per 100.
Across such a large variation, yes you will see the big differences. However, in studies looking at say, the final 8 swimmers at world championships there does not seem to be a relation between stroke count and speed. But also the speeds represented are very close together.
Correlations on tightly grouped data are not obvious and sometimes don't show up.
To that point, in my faster group of masters swimmers we have some people at 19 or 20, some at 14 and they swim roughly the same speed.
