The idea of swimming in a line treats your body as if it is a stable object. If one end is lifting up, the other is pushing down.
Your line extends from your toes to the top of your head. It is important to be flat on the top of the water. This contradicts the established paradigm of common swimming advice where your body used to be treated as a speed boat, the faster you moved the higher your front end became to split the water.
Swimming the line decreases the amount of frontal and rear drag. Lifting your head high out of the water may feel like you are riding higher out of the water but you are lowering the bottom half of your body.
This goes for all competitive strokes. One line will move through the water faster and easier than the several broken lines of our land based body.
YOU MUST LEARN TO MANIPULATE YOUR BODY TO MAKE IT A LINE!
At first it is a difficult thing to do. It requires practice. One practice drill is to line yourself against a wall. All of your back should be against the wall as you drive your hips/pelvis forward. Your aim is to remove the curve of your lower back.
Monday 21 December 2009
Saturday 19 December 2009
DRY LAND TRAINING.....
Integrate dry land work into the water programme
Ask yourself the question your session you are performing making you tired or is it training you?
Aim of dry land work is to develop the best swimming athlete possible!
Effort does not equal intensity
Recognise the differences in Male & females in terms of framework.
Make Training accumulative. Quote “1 session does not make an athlete but 1 session could break a swimmer”
Train movements not muscles – aggregate muscle action. “Neurologically, the brain does not recognise individual muscles; it recognises patterns of movements”
Train linkage of muscles
“Train toe nails to finger nails” – the function of a muscle depends critically on the context in which it is activated.
Demands of the event and of the stroke lead to adaptations of the programme – look at what the muscle is doing in the water and then ensure land programme is similar movements.
Failure is ok – as long as this then becomes the new goal!
All components should be trained throughout the whole year.
Machines lead to 1 plane movements therefore want to use all plane movements
Use movements with Med balls, especially before swimming “Wake up to Core”
Serape Effect – diagonal rotation patterns, emphasis on rotation therefore need lighter balls (3kg max)
Use dumb bells instead of bars – allows for more individual muscles and groups to work independently.
Emphasis on catching, not always throwing
When using stretch cords look at doing backwards movements
Use hurdles – especially for breaststrokers
Use core work as warm up then can bring the warm up in the swim session down.
Plan for sessions – Functionally strong, fast, fit, get specific
Periodisation
Foundation Strength – Total body and multiple joints movements with external resistance and body weight.
Basic strength – Volume loading through push/pull/squat sequence work
Power endurance – High Intensity work 20-30sec with 1:1 rest in multiple sets – emphasis on total body work out
Strength Endurance – 30-60secs with recovery up to 1:1 or 1:1.5
Recycle (Taper) – emphasis on recycling all of the above through short periods to refresh those aspects needed.
Ask yourself the question : Is the session you are performing making you tired or is it training you?
Ask yourself the question your session you are performing making you tired or is it training you?
Aim of dry land work is to develop the best swimming athlete possible!
Effort does not equal intensity
Recognise the differences in Male & females in terms of framework.
Make Training accumulative. Quote “1 session does not make an athlete but 1 session could break a swimmer”
Train movements not muscles – aggregate muscle action. “Neurologically, the brain does not recognise individual muscles; it recognises patterns of movements”
Train linkage of muscles
“Train toe nails to finger nails” – the function of a muscle depends critically on the context in which it is activated.
Demands of the event and of the stroke lead to adaptations of the programme – look at what the muscle is doing in the water and then ensure land programme is similar movements.
Failure is ok – as long as this then becomes the new goal!
All components should be trained throughout the whole year.
Machines lead to 1 plane movements therefore want to use all plane movements
Use movements with Med balls, especially before swimming “Wake up to Core”
Serape Effect – diagonal rotation patterns, emphasis on rotation therefore need lighter balls (3kg max)
Use dumb bells instead of bars – allows for more individual muscles and groups to work independently.
Emphasis on catching, not always throwing
When using stretch cords look at doing backwards movements
Use hurdles – especially for breaststrokers
Use core work as warm up then can bring the warm up in the swim session down.
Plan for sessions – Functionally strong, fast, fit, get specific
Periodisation
Foundation Strength – Total body and multiple joints movements with external resistance and body weight.
Basic strength – Volume loading through push/pull/squat sequence work
Power endurance – High Intensity work 20-30sec with 1:1 rest in multiple sets – emphasis on total body work out
Strength Endurance – 30-60secs with recovery up to 1:1 or 1:1.5
Recycle (Taper) – emphasis on recycling all of the above through short periods to refresh those aspects needed.
Ask yourself the question : Is the session you are performing making you tired or is it training you?
STRENGTH VERSUS POWER....
There is no doubt that muscular power is the determining factor in the success of competition swimming. This is even more apparent in sprint swimming particularly the 50m event, which can be regarded as a maximum-effort power event. In this area, weight work will certainly be efficacious – but there are restrictions.
The requirement of the stroke itself creates a problem in an analogous strength-training program. Strength alone – and that appears to be the target of most weight training schedules – is not an important issue.
Power is the product of force and velocity and within this formula lays the success or failure of any gym program.
Demonstrations from researchers have found that it takes .5 to .8 of a second to apply maximum force during the stroke. Unfortunately, the most powerful section of a swimmer’s stroke only lasts for .3 to .4 of a second (Rasulbekov et al 1986), which means of course, that the swimmer cannot achieve maximum efficiency during the pull regardless of strength levels. There simply is insufficient time during the stroke to achieve maximum effort.
The power produced during muscular contractions is largely dependant on both force and velocity. Therefore, increasing the force factor alone may not improve the gain in power if the speed of the stroke is compromised in any way.
However, if Stroke Power could be increased by specific strengthening work, then more force could be applied earlier, and then carried through the whole stroke movement resulting in an increased swim velocity.
These principles need to be kept in mind when tailoring a weight program so that exercises are heavy enough to increase strength and fast enough in application to elicit a response in speed.
A further problem in improving power output is the water itself. Because of its mobile and fluid nature it can be difficult to design a resistance program relevant to the swimming strokes. Another complication is the very nature of the swimming strokes.
Because of the movement patterns peculiar to swimming, it can be difficult to copy those strokes in dry land exercises. Specificity is always the main aim in the design of such programs and care must be taken to assimilate as close as possible the movements, speed, contractions and stroke patterns.
All dry land and water-based exercises within the macro cycle of training that are designed to increase the swimmer’s speed should be focused on production of power regardless of their ergonomic structure. When that power is applied to the stroke efficiently the swimmer’s velocity will increase naturally.
Swimming power could be defined as the ability to combine an efficient stroke application of a maximum effort force with a stroke function velocity, sufficient to achieve an optimal swim speed.
The requirement of the stroke itself creates a problem in an analogous strength-training program. Strength alone – and that appears to be the target of most weight training schedules – is not an important issue.
Power is the product of force and velocity and within this formula lays the success or failure of any gym program.
Demonstrations from researchers have found that it takes .5 to .8 of a second to apply maximum force during the stroke. Unfortunately, the most powerful section of a swimmer’s stroke only lasts for .3 to .4 of a second (Rasulbekov et al 1986), which means of course, that the swimmer cannot achieve maximum efficiency during the pull regardless of strength levels. There simply is insufficient time during the stroke to achieve maximum effort.
The power produced during muscular contractions is largely dependant on both force and velocity. Therefore, increasing the force factor alone may not improve the gain in power if the speed of the stroke is compromised in any way.
However, if Stroke Power could be increased by specific strengthening work, then more force could be applied earlier, and then carried through the whole stroke movement resulting in an increased swim velocity.
These principles need to be kept in mind when tailoring a weight program so that exercises are heavy enough to increase strength and fast enough in application to elicit a response in speed.
A further problem in improving power output is the water itself. Because of its mobile and fluid nature it can be difficult to design a resistance program relevant to the swimming strokes. Another complication is the very nature of the swimming strokes.
Because of the movement patterns peculiar to swimming, it can be difficult to copy those strokes in dry land exercises. Specificity is always the main aim in the design of such programs and care must be taken to assimilate as close as possible the movements, speed, contractions and stroke patterns.
All dry land and water-based exercises within the macro cycle of training that are designed to increase the swimmer’s speed should be focused on production of power regardless of their ergonomic structure. When that power is applied to the stroke efficiently the swimmer’s velocity will increase naturally.
Swimming power could be defined as the ability to combine an efficient stroke application of a maximum effort force with a stroke function velocity, sufficient to achieve an optimal swim speed.
Thursday 17 December 2009
SAM FREAS ON SPRINT TRAINING.........
Let's go to the sets. You have to swim fast every day if you're going to swim fast. How many people sprint the first day? God bless you. How many people sprint the second day? Same people. Why not? Every single day you have to be swimming fast if they're going to swim fast. We trash more people including myself during pre-season than I can possibly imagine.
The book goes into precise sets that we do. I'm going to give you my favorite sets. My first favorite set is what I call speed development, where we have blades on our hands, hands are straight out, we kick, and we keep really high feet.
I don't think we have too many good sprinters right now. There was a time when we had some people going 19.2, 19.3, and a whole bunch of guys in America swimming really fast. And why don't we have people swimming real fast right now? Why don't we have people swimming real fast right now... I love Dennis Pursley as a person, more than you can imagine.
He's a great father. He's everything that everybody should try to be. But taking short course out of the swimming equation in our country is wrong. You can develop speed better in a 15 yard pool, a 12 yard pool, than in a 50 meter pool.
I know we were swimming better in 1974, 1976, than we are now. Why? Because it was the height of... and it's not the only answer, but short course swimming develops speed. A 20 yard pool is really important. A 15 yard pool is really important.
So the drill: head out, full speed, and they have to max out. HAMMER DOWN. MAX OUT! Our whole society doesn't do that. We always hold back. Don't hold back. GO NUTS! And I wasn't afraid to jump up and down and scream and holler and go nuts, while all the other cool coaches were quiet.
A guy that I love, I'll never forget, called me a very dirty name at the Southeast Conference Championships, because I got too emotional. It's okay to get emotional, because we're dealing with the human spirit, it's an emotional thing. How many people when you see "Running Brave" don't feel something special when you see Billy Mills coming out of nowhere in the 10,000 meters. It's an emotional thing.
Hands out straight, feet up. Four of them, maxing out. With blades, head up, water polo stroke, full speed. MAXING OUT! Take the blades off. Head up. Four, no interval. Interval? You put an interval on something they can't max out. The key is learning how to max out.
You have to supervise that. The next thing you do is take your blades off and you either do it with fins and then you max out. And that used to set people pretty well.
Next thing: weight belts. All that weighted swimming is paramount. The one that used to make people blow lunch more than anybody else and would make every swimming coach proud that you had them do it, is that you would put a 10 lb weight on a swimmer, have them dive off the block, and have them descend 5 x 100's.
First length underwater with a 10 lb weight, freestyle with head up out of the water, butterfly with head up out of the water, and then no breath coming back with a 10 lb weight. Descend five of these. Guys: I was as close to getting beat up in that set than any swimming coach in the world. It's a very good one. Swimming underwater, 100's, 50's with the first length underwater maxing out.
The other thing is, don't breathe when you sprint. This longitudinal rotational thing that I've always been taught and you've been taught, it's wrong. Good-bye.
For 200 meters, 400 meters, distance swimming, if you don't longitudinally rotate, you're hurting. But the fastest way to theoretically swim is to try and square your shoulders and get them up out of the water as high as you can. I know I'm blowing your mind. Try it, you'll like it.
The book goes into precise sets that we do. I'm going to give you my favorite sets. My first favorite set is what I call speed development, where we have blades on our hands, hands are straight out, we kick, and we keep really high feet.
I don't think we have too many good sprinters right now. There was a time when we had some people going 19.2, 19.3, and a whole bunch of guys in America swimming really fast. And why don't we have people swimming real fast right now? Why don't we have people swimming real fast right now... I love Dennis Pursley as a person, more than you can imagine.
He's a great father. He's everything that everybody should try to be. But taking short course out of the swimming equation in our country is wrong. You can develop speed better in a 15 yard pool, a 12 yard pool, than in a 50 meter pool.
I know we were swimming better in 1974, 1976, than we are now. Why? Because it was the height of... and it's not the only answer, but short course swimming develops speed. A 20 yard pool is really important. A 15 yard pool is really important.
So the drill: head out, full speed, and they have to max out. HAMMER DOWN. MAX OUT! Our whole society doesn't do that. We always hold back. Don't hold back. GO NUTS! And I wasn't afraid to jump up and down and scream and holler and go nuts, while all the other cool coaches were quiet.
A guy that I love, I'll never forget, called me a very dirty name at the Southeast Conference Championships, because I got too emotional. It's okay to get emotional, because we're dealing with the human spirit, it's an emotional thing. How many people when you see "Running Brave" don't feel something special when you see Billy Mills coming out of nowhere in the 10,000 meters. It's an emotional thing.
Hands out straight, feet up. Four of them, maxing out. With blades, head up, water polo stroke, full speed. MAXING OUT! Take the blades off. Head up. Four, no interval. Interval? You put an interval on something they can't max out. The key is learning how to max out.
You have to supervise that. The next thing you do is take your blades off and you either do it with fins and then you max out. And that used to set people pretty well.
Next thing: weight belts. All that weighted swimming is paramount. The one that used to make people blow lunch more than anybody else and would make every swimming coach proud that you had them do it, is that you would put a 10 lb weight on a swimmer, have them dive off the block, and have them descend 5 x 100's.
First length underwater with a 10 lb weight, freestyle with head up out of the water, butterfly with head up out of the water, and then no breath coming back with a 10 lb weight. Descend five of these. Guys: I was as close to getting beat up in that set than any swimming coach in the world. It's a very good one. Swimming underwater, 100's, 50's with the first length underwater maxing out.
The other thing is, don't breathe when you sprint. This longitudinal rotational thing that I've always been taught and you've been taught, it's wrong. Good-bye.
For 200 meters, 400 meters, distance swimming, if you don't longitudinally rotate, you're hurting. But the fastest way to theoretically swim is to try and square your shoulders and get them up out of the water as high as you can. I know I'm blowing your mind. Try it, you'll like it.
AXIOMS...THE FOLLOWING ARE WIDELY ACCEPTED TRUTHS...
I obtained these Axioms from my good friend and sprint coach Dr. Sam Freas...
Speed is lost in freestyle whenever the shoulder is placed into the water by longitudinal rotation.
Make sure you follow through with everything. When things are going well, be even more attentive to detail.
Elevating the pain threshold is extremely important in training a sprinter.
Do not create unnecessary scheduling conflicts in a sprinter's environment.
Do not expect a great championship season unless the preseason and season were properly planned and executed.
You can only control what you do, not others.
Always contact athletes who do not attend practice.
Speed is lost in freestyle whenever the shoulder is placed into the water by longitudinal rotation.
Make sure you follow through with everything. When things are going well, be even more attentive to detail.
Elevating the pain threshold is extremely important in training a sprinter.
Do not create unnecessary scheduling conflicts in a sprinter's environment.
Do not expect a great championship season unless the preseason and season were properly planned and executed.
You can only control what you do, not others.
Always contact athletes who do not attend practice.
TEN ESSENTIALS OF SPRINTING BY SAM FREAS
1. Race every day in practice.
2. Swim at 100% speed all year long, not just during a taper.
3. Swim superfast all year long, not just during a taper.
4. Always work dryland to improve the components of fitness: strength,
cardiovascular endurance, muscular endurance, agility and flexibility.
5. Work on starts, turns and finishes almost every day in practice
(at least five workouts per week).
6. Practice swimming with no breath during a 50 and with only a few breath
during a 100. This gives better body position and better speed.
7. Execute a high kick with the heels nine to fifteen inches out of the water...
This a gives better body position.
8. Practice reaction drills every day.
9. Change the training if a loss of speed results due to the trashing of the
cardiovascular system or overtraining of the neuromuscular system.
10. Be happy, don't worry; get plenty of sleep and eat healthily.
2. Swim at 100% speed all year long, not just during a taper.
3. Swim superfast all year long, not just during a taper.
4. Always work dryland to improve the components of fitness: strength,
cardiovascular endurance, muscular endurance, agility and flexibility.
5. Work on starts, turns and finishes almost every day in practice
(at least five workouts per week).
6. Practice swimming with no breath during a 50 and with only a few breath
during a 100. This gives better body position and better speed.
7. Execute a high kick with the heels nine to fifteen inches out of the water...
This a gives better body position.
8. Practice reaction drills every day.
9. Change the training if a loss of speed results due to the trashing of the
cardiovascular system or overtraining of the neuromuscular system.
10. Be happy, don't worry; get plenty of sleep and eat healthily.
Tuesday 15 December 2009
LEARN TO SWIM LIKE A HUMAN....NOT A FISH!
Over the span of a decade or so I have seen many articles, a few books, videos and a growth industry in clinics and individual tuition from various companies, that have been flooding the swimming and triathlon communities, promising to teach the secret to successful, fast swimming.
The information disseminated through the media of these articles, books, DVD’s and clinics sounds very impressive, as they encourage swimmers of all abilities to stop trying so hard during their swim sessions and ‘tune into’ swimming slippery.
But, that is not all, these articles etc go on to inform us that as coaches we are teaching/coaching, and training swimmers incorrectly. To this end the mantra we are subjected to enable our swimmers to swim fast, is that we must teach our swimmers to swim on their sides like a fish, and maintain a body position like a racing yacht.
These ideas are not based on biomechanical principles of propulsion, Physics or the analyses of world-class swimmers.
Since we are human and in no way assembled like fish, it is foolish to base any stroke technique or an entire training philosophy around these principles.
If you ever hear a Coach/instructor state that they "will have you swimming like fish" walk away,or better still tell them to go to the nearset Aquarium! No human can swim like a fish,not even close.
Check the speed that fish can attain i did and if I just pick one, say the Sailfish... that fish can reach velocities of up to 68 miles per hour.
Now, that is quite quick even for a car. In comparison, a world-record freestyle swimmer limps along at barely five miles per hour.
A fish's bulging muscles are packed along its sides. That's where a fish gets most of its swimming power. Fish may be up to 80 percent muscle, and these muscles are different from swimmers muscles.
Next time you buy some fish for your dinner look at the fish meat before you cook it. Fish muscle look like sideways W's stacked inside each other. These W's are called Myomeres (my-oh-mears).
When a fish wants to move forward, it begins a side-to-side wiggle that starts at its front and moves to its back. As this wiggle goes backward,the fish goes forward. The wiggle starts when the myomeres behind the fish's head on one side pull themselves shorter, and then the myomeres on the other side pull themselves shorter.
This much like football fans at the World Cup performing the now famous Mexican wave, these muscle contractions progress from side to side toward the back of the fish,and end with the flip of the fish's tail.
Of course, all fish are better swimmers than people. That's to be expected since they were born in the water and get to practice swimming every day. But if you put a fish on dry land, you can outrun it every time!
It has also been stated, by the promoters of “fish like” swimming that, “the most hydro-dynamically position that your body can be in is lying on your side, one arm extended for length and balanced. Not so very different from the way fish do.”
This statement really does upset my equilibrium, because 99.9% of fish in the oceans of the world DO NOT SWIM ON THEIR SIDE.
Take a look a very close look at fish... and you will become aware of a large fin sticking up toward the surface of the water. This fin is called the dorsal fin, and in my dictionary dorsal means back or upper surface. The dorsal fin is on the fish’s back, which means the back is up, and the front is down toward the bottom of the sea. In other words……. fish swim on their stomach not on their side.
The truth of the matter is that the concept of swimming like a fish lacks a whole lot of creditability. It is like seeing an advert in a magazine or a book that states you can perform gymnastics like an orangatang!
Can you imagine the break through this type of discovery would mean to the world of gymnastics?
Here are just a few of problems with the concept of fish like swimming…
• When swimming freestyle holding your body on it’s side will not increase or decrease the amount of drag or resistance than what is created when holding the body in a prone position. (On the Stomach) Why? Because buoyancy, lift forces from the water remain the same no matter what the position of the body.
• It is virtually impossible to generate propulsive forces from a long side stretched position. The muscles of the upper body cannot achieve efficient position to execute an effective freestyle pull, if the body is rotated perpendicular with the bottom of the pool.
• When a swimmer maintains this long stretched position as has been suggested, they will experience a drop in velocity followed by an increase in velocity. When a swimmer decreases their velocity and the suddenly increases it also known as negative acceleration and positive acceleration they must over come inertia. Newton’s first Law implies that far more energy is required to overcome inertia than is required to maintain inertia. Therefore the swimmer is wasting valuable energy repeatedly overcoming inertia.
• Maintaining a streamlined position is not more important than maintaining balance. If a swimmers streamlining is improved and no change occurs to their balance in the water, the swimmer will get not faster. If a swimmers balance iis improved and no change is made in regards to their streamlining, the swimmer will get faster.
But, if both are improved the swimmer will see the greatest increase to their velocity through the water of all. To eliminate one at the expense of the other is a waste of time and effort and will not result in successful swimming.
Since humans are not fish, it does not make since to try and copy either in an effort to gain improved efficiency when swimming. This is not to say that a streamlined position is not desirable, it is.
Professor Bill Boomer states “streamlining is very important but should not be emphasized at the expense of developing great balance in the water."
This is achieved via a series of unique swimming drills to develop a sense of floating or feeling “suspended” in the water creating a horizontal position, not vertical.
Balance is important because without it in the water there is no way to stay afloat unless the arms and legs are constantly moving to keep us from sinking to the bottom. However, we want to use the arms and legs to assist in moving forward, not prevent us from becoming a bottom feeder. The swim instructors of our youth gave us some poor information by telling us to “kick harder” or “move the arms faster”.
Once a swimmer is feeling more balanced the next step is to begin the process of streamlining and lengthening the bodyline. By getting more on your side (no more than 45 degrees) to streamline and extending the arm to lengthen the body, drag is reduced in the water. If you want to design a fast moving boat, engineers design a long, slick, narrow hull. The same is true for humans: create a long swimmer and you will have continuous force application.”
The best approach to improving swimming is to learn from what the very best are doing. Here are a few characteristics current great swimmers all have in common.
1. World Class swimmers have a maximum rotation of 45 degrees to the left and to the right. Not the “fish like” goal of 90 degrees to each side.
2. World Class swimmers do not leave their arm extended for a long period of Time. The length of time the upper arm is extended for is “dependent on the Duration between arm recovery and propulsion.” Taller male and female swimmers all always demonstrate this stroke characteristic. Federica Pellegrini is a great example of this of stroke style.
3. The best swimmers are good at streamlining and have effective propulsion.
Swimming technique is not limited to any one aspect of the stroke. Swimming is a complicated sport where the athlete is suspended in fluid, and every action will create an opposite and equal reaction. (This is Newton’s third law. Just in case you were wondering.) Sometimes the reaction is positive, other times the reaction results in technique flaws and hampers performance.
Freestyle is a stroke that requires constant movement through a range of motion, no pauses should occur in any one position, especially if that pause detracts from or limits propulsive forces. To recommend swimming on ones side (90 degrees) may reduce a small amount of resistance. I say may because most indications suggest that it is no different than swimming in a prone position.
However, the restriction and reduction of propulsive forces make it not worth the effort and in fact will harm performance. One thing is certain; none of the great freestyle swimmers swim on their side.
Fish do no swim on their side. And if you want to swim at high velocity, you probably should not swim on your side either.
The information disseminated through the media of these articles, books, DVD’s and clinics sounds very impressive, as they encourage swimmers of all abilities to stop trying so hard during their swim sessions and ‘tune into’ swimming slippery.
But, that is not all, these articles etc go on to inform us that as coaches we are teaching/coaching, and training swimmers incorrectly. To this end the mantra we are subjected to enable our swimmers to swim fast, is that we must teach our swimmers to swim on their sides like a fish, and maintain a body position like a racing yacht.
These ideas are not based on biomechanical principles of propulsion, Physics or the analyses of world-class swimmers.
Since we are human and in no way assembled like fish, it is foolish to base any stroke technique or an entire training philosophy around these principles.
If you ever hear a Coach/instructor state that they "will have you swimming like fish" walk away,or better still tell them to go to the nearset Aquarium! No human can swim like a fish,not even close.
Check the speed that fish can attain i did and if I just pick one, say the Sailfish... that fish can reach velocities of up to 68 miles per hour.
Now, that is quite quick even for a car. In comparison, a world-record freestyle swimmer limps along at barely five miles per hour.
A fish's bulging muscles are packed along its sides. That's where a fish gets most of its swimming power. Fish may be up to 80 percent muscle, and these muscles are different from swimmers muscles.
Next time you buy some fish for your dinner look at the fish meat before you cook it. Fish muscle look like sideways W's stacked inside each other. These W's are called Myomeres (my-oh-mears).
When a fish wants to move forward, it begins a side-to-side wiggle that starts at its front and moves to its back. As this wiggle goes backward,the fish goes forward. The wiggle starts when the myomeres behind the fish's head on one side pull themselves shorter, and then the myomeres on the other side pull themselves shorter.
This much like football fans at the World Cup performing the now famous Mexican wave, these muscle contractions progress from side to side toward the back of the fish,and end with the flip of the fish's tail.
Of course, all fish are better swimmers than people. That's to be expected since they were born in the water and get to practice swimming every day. But if you put a fish on dry land, you can outrun it every time!
It has also been stated, by the promoters of “fish like” swimming that, “the most hydro-dynamically position that your body can be in is lying on your side, one arm extended for length and balanced. Not so very different from the way fish do.”
This statement really does upset my equilibrium, because 99.9% of fish in the oceans of the world DO NOT SWIM ON THEIR SIDE.
Take a look a very close look at fish... and you will become aware of a large fin sticking up toward the surface of the water. This fin is called the dorsal fin, and in my dictionary dorsal means back or upper surface. The dorsal fin is on the fish’s back, which means the back is up, and the front is down toward the bottom of the sea. In other words……. fish swim on their stomach not on their side.
The truth of the matter is that the concept of swimming like a fish lacks a whole lot of creditability. It is like seeing an advert in a magazine or a book that states you can perform gymnastics like an orangatang!
Can you imagine the break through this type of discovery would mean to the world of gymnastics?
Here are just a few of problems with the concept of fish like swimming…
• When swimming freestyle holding your body on it’s side will not increase or decrease the amount of drag or resistance than what is created when holding the body in a prone position. (On the Stomach) Why? Because buoyancy, lift forces from the water remain the same no matter what the position of the body.
• It is virtually impossible to generate propulsive forces from a long side stretched position. The muscles of the upper body cannot achieve efficient position to execute an effective freestyle pull, if the body is rotated perpendicular with the bottom of the pool.
• When a swimmer maintains this long stretched position as has been suggested, they will experience a drop in velocity followed by an increase in velocity. When a swimmer decreases their velocity and the suddenly increases it also known as negative acceleration and positive acceleration they must over come inertia. Newton’s first Law implies that far more energy is required to overcome inertia than is required to maintain inertia. Therefore the swimmer is wasting valuable energy repeatedly overcoming inertia.
• Maintaining a streamlined position is not more important than maintaining balance. If a swimmers streamlining is improved and no change occurs to their balance in the water, the swimmer will get not faster. If a swimmers balance iis improved and no change is made in regards to their streamlining, the swimmer will get faster.
But, if both are improved the swimmer will see the greatest increase to their velocity through the water of all. To eliminate one at the expense of the other is a waste of time and effort and will not result in successful swimming.
Since humans are not fish, it does not make since to try and copy either in an effort to gain improved efficiency when swimming. This is not to say that a streamlined position is not desirable, it is.
Professor Bill Boomer states “streamlining is very important but should not be emphasized at the expense of developing great balance in the water."
This is achieved via a series of unique swimming drills to develop a sense of floating or feeling “suspended” in the water creating a horizontal position, not vertical.
Balance is important because without it in the water there is no way to stay afloat unless the arms and legs are constantly moving to keep us from sinking to the bottom. However, we want to use the arms and legs to assist in moving forward, not prevent us from becoming a bottom feeder. The swim instructors of our youth gave us some poor information by telling us to “kick harder” or “move the arms faster”.
Once a swimmer is feeling more balanced the next step is to begin the process of streamlining and lengthening the bodyline. By getting more on your side (no more than 45 degrees) to streamline and extending the arm to lengthen the body, drag is reduced in the water. If you want to design a fast moving boat, engineers design a long, slick, narrow hull. The same is true for humans: create a long swimmer and you will have continuous force application.”
The best approach to improving swimming is to learn from what the very best are doing. Here are a few characteristics current great swimmers all have in common.
1. World Class swimmers have a maximum rotation of 45 degrees to the left and to the right. Not the “fish like” goal of 90 degrees to each side.
2. World Class swimmers do not leave their arm extended for a long period of Time. The length of time the upper arm is extended for is “dependent on the Duration between arm recovery and propulsion.” Taller male and female swimmers all always demonstrate this stroke characteristic. Federica Pellegrini is a great example of this of stroke style.
3. The best swimmers are good at streamlining and have effective propulsion.
Swimming technique is not limited to any one aspect of the stroke. Swimming is a complicated sport where the athlete is suspended in fluid, and every action will create an opposite and equal reaction. (This is Newton’s third law. Just in case you were wondering.) Sometimes the reaction is positive, other times the reaction results in technique flaws and hampers performance.
Freestyle is a stroke that requires constant movement through a range of motion, no pauses should occur in any one position, especially if that pause detracts from or limits propulsive forces. To recommend swimming on ones side (90 degrees) may reduce a small amount of resistance. I say may because most indications suggest that it is no different than swimming in a prone position.
However, the restriction and reduction of propulsive forces make it not worth the effort and in fact will harm performance. One thing is certain; none of the great freestyle swimmers swim on their side.
Fish do no swim on their side. And if you want to swim at high velocity, you probably should not swim on your side either.
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