Tweaking my swim

I’ve been swimming regularly and have had many coaches over the last decade. Yet I’ve been frustrated that I’m not getting much faster.

At times in recent years I’ve pulled off faster sprints over 25m, 50m and 100m.

Endurance isn’t an issue - at least not in the sense that I can get in the water and swim continuously for a solid hour or longer with few breaks.

And so I recently told Coach Roseline that I wasn’t happy with my swim. I’m investing too much time for too little return. The purpose of my comment was: what do I need to do to swim faster?

Coach Roseline had a simple starting point: Stop fighting the water. 

And then, after a video review a few other tweaks were relayed to me:

Extend the forward entry arm/hand just a bit more.

Slow down my arms. It’s not a race to see how fast I can throw my arms forward.

Pull with focus. Anchor my hand, pull the water and then push it. Do this with effort when speed is the objective. But keep my arms moving forward above the water at the same speed.

Glide a little longer. In other words, increase the distance that I cover with each stroke.

Breathe less often. When I accelerate or when I get tired, I breathe every stroke.

And voila. 

I did an unexpected 400m TT on Friday and knocked 20 secs off the time I set about 10 days ago - which prompted my initial - recent - frustration.

I’m still not where I want to be in terms of swimming with less effort and generating more speed but it’s early in the season and now I have some concrete things to focus on in the water.