Swimming – advice please

Have recently started swimming a lot more to help cardio etc. Finding it is really helping with my riding but am struggling with technique a little, it’s one of those sports that looks so elegant when done well (which I don’t). Does anybody have recommendations/videos/guides they can point me in the direction that may help?

Google films on Swim Smooth and/or Total Immersion, these are the two leading schools of thought regarding technique

IMHO I find the Swim Smooth website more helpful.

I think the swim smooth stuff is really good, but personally I’d try and find a local Tri Club and attend a few of their swim sessions. Our local club divide the pool into technique lanes and training lanes, so you can choose to work on technique or fitness/speed.

If you can’t find a local Tri Club you could try and find a Masters club, but the swimming standard may be a bit of a high/tough.

I’m tempted by lessons, might try the gym to see if they do something. If it’s something I am going to do for the next 30 or so years then it is worth learning properly I guess. Tri clubs might be a little advanced for now, but worth bearing in mind.

Will have a nose through the guides above, many thanks.

Lessons or join a local swimming club.

I swam from aged 11 – 18, a lot, competing in galas and comps all over. I’m rusty now but you never lose that technique.

If you don’t want to join a club then the swimsmooth book is also a very good buy and not pricey

+1 for lessons. Although I used online videos (culled from youtube) personally, I know I would benefit from a hands on approach with observation and critique. One point – I was a poor swimmer from a young age and after a few near drownings on holiday I left swimming until later in life. Have now been a regular (pool) swimmer for over a year and found that regular practice ( in my case 3-5X a week, around 50 lengths a session) increases my strength, stamina, lung capacity and agility to a point where I just become much smoother and faster – when it feels fluid and exhilarating rather than a struggle. Find that any lulls (pool closure, travel etc) in my programme set me back and I feel clunky again for a while. Sounds so obvious but it really is a marked difference.

+1 for swim smooth. Some very simple advice would be just to relax and not try to go as fast as you can as that tires you very quickly. But seriously, make a conscious effort to relax as much as you can.

I did ‘Art of Swimming’ coached sessions, like swim smooth and based on Alexander Technique posture stuff. Was very pricey initially till I struck a direct deal with the coach. Worked well for me with hypermobile joints and took me from 22 strokes to 17/18 per 25m length crawl. Worth a google.

Tri-clubs should be very welcoming, and have a broad range of abilities so you won’t feel out of your comfort zone. I also like the swim smooth stuff, pool toys make a big difference too, pull-buoys, kick boards and fins are all brilliant for encouraging particular aspects of technique. Really focusing on one element at a time of your stroke works well, rather than getting frustrated at trying to do everything at once.

Tri club too advanced? No way! Have you seen the way the average triathlete (me included) swims? I’m convinced the only thing that means most triathletes can complete a 3.8 swim without drowning is the floaty wetsuit. I did a French champs once where no wet suits were allowed despite swimming in the chilly Dordogne – the last 200m were done on survival instinct not competitive spirit.

Swim smooth is a good point to start and when you’ve got to grips with that a bit of personal coaching.

I have learnt to swim over the course of the last 2 years. I spent a long time at first just doing my swimming using a pull-bouy, which was good as it immediately allows you to knock out a massive amount of lengths while you focus purely on what your arms are doing, however, at some point I became too dependent on it and it was preventing me from learning how to properly swim so be wary of over reliance on any of the swimming training aids.

There are loads of sites on the internet that will overload you with info, I think the key to it is to focus on each thing individually, and for that there are various drills you can do. The ones I found most helpful were swimming with your fists clenched to teach you how to catch, and then “catch up” swimming, which allows you to focus on what each arm does during the stroke. I never do this in any real structured way, just in the middle of a session I chuck in a few lengths of each.

The other key thing that really helped me was the breathing, at first I was trying to do all my breathing while my face was out of the water, someone told me that as soon as my face was in the water I should be breathing out quite hard, then turn to just breathe in and it changed everything. Once you get that sorted the whole thing immediately becomes very relaxed.

i love swimming threads…

i’ve been able to swim since i was a little kid and i surf. a few years back i went in a pool and timed myself over 400m, having no idea what a decent time was, and my time was 10mins plus. when i looked on the swim club boards outside the pool my time was outside the youngest girls category.

a few months after, and i’d been doing more swimming, my wife’s godfather, a retired swim teacher, looked at me in a pool and said ‘you can’t swim’.

jump forward a bit and i posted this…

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/getting-a-400m-swim-time-down-how-to-train

ever since then i have more or less swum 2/3 times a week in winter (generally 4 x 400m sets) one a training sesh with my local tri club and openwater swimming in summer. in openwater races i’m about 1/3 up the pack in my age group so not that fast nor too slow. 400 time is 7.08 last time i was timed. under 8 very comfortably.

i started watching youtube clips et al and the breakthrough clip for me, that i still come back to, is…

books, swimsmooth is good but a bit dry. i prefer total immersion as its more about feel. art of swimming i just cant get my head around. all are cheap as on ebay so buy them all and go with the one you like.

but don’t get too bogged down on technique. i started to, and when i saw how bad i was (filmed) it put me right off swimming for a few months. now i just go, i know my ass sinks and its the big factor slowing me down, i play with that a bit but mainly i go to swim as it helps my surfing immensley.

I’ve not been in a pool properly for years, might actually get back into it.

Not sure what my time for 400m was, 200m front crawl I was under 2 mins at 14. I would be very surprised if I got that now!

I would check a swimming club, I remember at mine they had a ‘masters team’ basically parents and the like, wanting to keep fit.

Overwhelming response, thanks so much. Lots to consider/ review and am sure will help.

If you want to learn to swim watch a swimmer not a triathlete!
Most folks you see in the water have learnt how not to drown rather than how to swim.
You know the Mr Splashy guy in every pool? That’s how to waste your energy, thinks he must be good because he gets a good workout but his energy’s not going into forward motion. Seals and dolphins scooting from a to b are not known for the huge amounts of splashing about. 😉

Best way to improve most folks technique is back the power off and think about what you are doing and how your body feels as it’s moving through the water.
Treat it like a yoga session, loosen up and aim on getting balanced in the water. Start with the very basics, are you level? If not you will veer off course as one side of your stoke will be in the water longer than the other as you pull yourself through the water.

Then, are you flat front to back? You want to aim to present as small an area to the water in the direction you wish to go as possible.
You lift your head and your bum goes down so look at the bottom of the pool and move your eyes to look forward, not your head.

Even just practicing being flat and level by pushing off from the side of the pool and seeing how far you can go will improve your stroke. 🙂

If you’re doing crawl then aim to make yourself as long as possible, the tip of your middle finger is what enters the water on your centre line. Aim to ‘pierce’ the water, not splash, and then pull down along the centreline of your body, quite close to you (this helps keep you flat). Do this slowly, get it smooth and balanced before you add power, see how long you can glide on a single stroke.

Bend your elbow as you bring your arm back over your head (you are not a windmill! :D).

If you can, get someone to watch you from under the water to see if what you think is flat and level actually is.

Just work on your arms, unless you are in a 50m freestyle race then you don’t need to kick much, your feet are better used as rudders to help keep your body level than for propulsion.

Once you can do a nice gliding, well balanced stroke where your body’s flat and pointing in the right direction then you can add power to your pull stoke bit by bit, and when that’s sorted you can speed up your stroke rate! Safe in the knowledge that your energy is driving you forward! 🙂

Oh and as said above, breathe out under water and just turn your head to inhale, when you are moving the top of your head creates a bow wave and just behind it the water level dips so you don’t have to lift your head! (which helps to keep you level) but don’t worry about breathing until you’ve got your stroke basics sorted, you can easily do six or a dozen strokes with your face down when you are taking it slow and easy to get the technique right at the beginning.

Building your technique first, and then your power up, like this also means that you are less likely to get niggly injuries.

If you prefer breaststroke (which I do) then I can do a similar basics guide there too if interested.

Good swimming isn’t difficult it’s just (ime) generally taught badly, start by noticing what your body is doing, work towards a balance, add some grace and the speed will come even before you put the power in!
HTH

i feel your pain, I started learning front crawl a few months back and had a few lessons, helps using pool buoys for buoyancy etc. just break it down and expect it too frustrate you for months if you want to learn properly!

I’ve been thinking of taking swimming up and getting a few lessons. Haven’t swum for years and I swim like Mr Splashy guy Transmute describes.

Don’t swim in the sea. Fish have sex in it.

If you prefer breaststroke (which I do) then I can do a similar basics guide there too if interested.

I’d read with interest as tend to alternate strokes. You explained your crawl technique perfectly. Nice job!

transmute there are some great pointers in there, thanks for the time and detail.

I’m blimmin rubbish at swimming. I really wish I could swim properly as I always end up knackered in no time.