First: Breathing

The most common question I hear in the triathlete world about the mysteries of swimming efficiently usually involves something with breathing.

The rules of breathing: You need a breath, you take a breath.

Poor breathing technique and poor balance are the two primary challenges faced by unskilled swimmers. Both seem manageable so long as your face is in the water. But sooner or later they have to get some air and instantly they’re struggling instead of cruising, with their stroke falling apart 30 or more times a minute (or about 10 times every 25 yards). When you get the breathing right, it fits naturally into the stroke flow, and in fact, can even add power to your stroke because body roll is what produces power and you should roll more when taking a breath.

So if you shouldn’t breathe in the traditional way, how should you do it? Very simply. Rather than turning your head, breathe by using body roll to take your head to air while keeping your head aligned with your spine and your chin aligned with your sternum; you’ll start swimming more easily, comfortably and efficiently immediately.

Second: Kick

Use fins. Yes! I am a coach telling you to use fins. But not to “keep up” in workouts with them. If you have ankle flexibility issues (Runner’s Kick), use fins for a few weeks, but wean off them as you get closer to your event. The shorter fins are best. Fins can increase your ankle flexibility, allow you to do swimming drills with ease, and strengthen the correct leg muscles you need to kick.

Remember: You don’t need a super kick to have a great race in a triathlon. Your kick is mainly for stability and body rotation.

Triathlon Swimming
Swimmers don’t have to do a long bike and run after they swim, we do.

There are many aspects I have pointed out that have helped triathletes:
* Keep a low stroke count.
* Rotate the hips.
* Reduce the intensity of your kick.
* Keep your elbows high.
* Glide with each stroke.

Ten Steps to improve your Swim:

1. Hand Entry. Slice your hand into the water right about at your goggle line, and drive it forward. Many swimmers attempt to get as much “air time” as possible by reaching the hand out before entering into the water, but it is actually more efficient to go through the water with your hand as you rotate from one side to the other.

2. Head Position. Keep looking straight down when swimming freestyle. It’s important to keep your head down with only a small part of the back of your head out of the water. Also, as you rotate through the water, try not to move your head with the rest of your body rotation.

3. Pull. In freestyle, your hands should pull all the way back past your hips. The last part of the stroke before recovery (arms coming out of the water) should be an acceleration behind you, and not up out of the water.

4. Kick. Try minimizing your kick as you train for swimming. Most people will kick extra hard to make up for lack of balance in the water. Minimizing your kick will allow you to improve your balance, as well as conserve energy.

5. Training Intensity. The best way to measure your training intensity is to count your heart rate immediately after each swim. You can estimate your heart rate by counting your pulse rate for six seconds immediately after each swim. Add a zero to this count, and you will have your approximate exercise heart rate per minute.

6. Master’s Swimming. Move to a slower lane to work on stroke improvement. If you belong to a Master’s team, don’t feel that you always need to keep up with your lane-mates at every workout. Master’s teams typically have many people with many different swimming goals. It’s important to do your own thing! Remember that technique comes before all else and if this means swallowing a little pride to make improvements, just think of how much faster you will be for this in the long run.

7. Habit. Keep your arm from crossing over. One of the most common bad habits I see in swimmers is the arm crossing over to the opposite side on the pull. Breathing on your left side results in your right arm crossing over, breathing on your left side results in your right arm crossing. Often times this happens when one goes to breathe, but sometimes it’s caused just from over-rotating. To avoid this, make sure your head isn’t moving with the rest of your body, and try to pull more in a straight line (still bending the elbow) and ending the pull on the same side you started (i.e. right hand slices into the water, pulls back and hand ends up near right hip).

8. Keep the Feel. If swimming is your toughest sport, it is important to “keep the feel” for the water, and get in the water at least every other day (no, showers and baths don’t count!) This way, your body maintains its kinesthetic awareness of being balanced in water.

9. Work Those Lungs. Mix in some hypoxic training sets into your workouts. For example, do a set of 4×100’s breathing every 3-5-7-9 strokes by 25, with 15 seconds rest in between each 100. Your lungs will thank you for it towards the end of the swim part of your race!

10. Work Your Weakness. In the sport of triathlon, most coaches agree that you should spend the most time working on your weakest of the three sports. For many of you this will be swimming! Within swimming, the same concept applies. Spend the most time working on the weakest part of your stroke. If balancing on your side is an issue, do some kicking drills on your side. If moving your head is a problem, focus on head position most of the time. Whatever it is, you will gain the most by spending your pool time improving on that weakness.

Written by Felipe Louriero