Kevin Koskella has been coaching Masters Swim Teams in San Francisco and San Diego since 2001 and being an accomplished swimmer, has earned the highly prized All-American status at the college level. Kevin is a leader in aiding the beginner and experienced triathlete towards excellence in the swimming portion of the race.
He is also the owner of TriSwimCoach.com a highly regarded web site in the triathlon training world.
To watch now, just keep reading!
While the swim portion of the ironman may only represent 10 percent of the race, it does play a significant role in the outcome. The time taken to exit the water is just a fraction of the whole picture of performance— the state in which we exit the water and how much energy is expended during the swim is critical to the overall performance at the end of the day. Continue reading
The following is an article written by Andrea Himmel. Andrea almost died from a condition called swimming induced pulmonary edema (SIPE). It dose a good job of shinning some light on a condition that looks to be the reasons for deaths in the swim of triathlon. Here is Andreas story
I wanted to share something about the man who died during the latest Ironman US Championships in New York City, and my personal experience with the same medical condition he suffered from during the race.
After a year of training and focusing my life on this race, I had to pull out around mile 56 of the bike ride. I had developed what I learned was a swimming induced pulmonary edema (SIPE), a form of high output heart failure.
Now, we hear from people involved in the Ironman medical circles that the man who died after the swim likely died from SIPE. Luckily, mine didn’t get to that point because I pulled out. But, from what I understand, it doesn’t take much at all to get from where I was to it being fatal. He was a 2.5 hr marathoner and extremely fit. (I note to you there’s no way of knowing for sure how he died, but consensus among the medical folks is this is the most likely cause.)
Continue reading
Tonight Ben & Kerry will be talking about what you need to know as a beginner when
it comes to open water swimming.
Often then swim in a triathlon can be the most scary and stressful for a beginner.
Ben & Kerry are going to tell you all you need to know in order to be ready for your
next open water swimming experience.
The call kicks off at 9EST 6PST. To get your questions answered enter them in the box
below.
What is a good time for my age? is one of the most common questions we are asked at Swim Smooth and, to be honest, it’s a question we find uncomfortable to answer. That’s because it’s a bit of a loaded question.
L-R: Suzi, Barry, Brian, John, Emmie
One of the most important duties of a coach (of any type) is to help remove barriers from someone’s progress and absolutely never introduce new barriers that were not there to begin with. Normally a swimmer asking this question is looking for an easily achievable target, perhaps one slightly quicker than their current speed, that they can achieve and be happy with. On the face of it this may seem virtuous but such an answer creates a very self limiting mental state that can stay with the swimmer forever: I can’t be any better because of my age.
Duane Dobko has 17 years of competitive swimming experience and 7 years of triathlon experience. He was a former school record holder for the University of Minnesota in the 100 yard backstroke and was a Canadian National champion in the 50 meter backstroke in 1994. Duane was a 2003 Hawaii Ironman qualifier, finishing 26th in 2002 at Ironman Wisconsin, with the 3rd fastest overall swim split (49:03). Duane is currently swim coaching professional triathlete David Thompson, and competes for the Gear West Elite team out of Minnesota.
Duane has competed and set records in several Minnesota Masters Swimming meets. Duane recently competed at the 2008 USMS Short Course National Championships in Austin Texas where he beat a national record in the 200 Yard Backstroke with a time of 1:49.93.
We talk about wetsuits, swim starts, technique and more in this call. Keep reading to listen or download!
Tonight at 9EST / 6PST Ben & Kerry will be talking about what you need to know as
a beginner triathlete when swimming in the open water.
Open water, in race race settings, can often be intimidating and scary for those
who just starting in the sport.
Ben & Kerry will teaching you all the the thing you need to know and practice so
come race day you are able to perform at your best.
To Ask your questions on swimming in the open water answer them in the box below
As we mentioned last week on the blog, we hope you’ve been enjoying the FINA Swimming World Championships from Shanghai. (If the championships haven’t been shown on TV in your country you’ll find most races on YouTube)
The winners of both the men’s and women’s 1500m finals featured totally dominant performances from swimmers with very different stroke styles. Making the headlines in the men’s race was China’s Sun Yang, breaking Grant Hackett’s long standing world record of 10 years in the event. Sun’s strikingly long smooth stroke (taking just 28 strokes per 50m at 62 strokes per minute) perfectly matched his 1.98m tall (6’6″) long-limbed frame. You can watch the race here.
It would be easy to watch Sun’s performance and assume that everyone should aim to swim using this style but in the women’s race Lotte Friis from Denmark put in a fantastic winning performance, finishing just 7 seconds off Kate Zieglers’s world record. Lotte’s stroke has a completely different style from Sun’s, using a straight arm recovery with a much shorter faster stroke. In direct comparison to Sun, Lotte took 43 strokes per 50m at 88 strokes per minute. Still very tall at 1.84m (6’0″), Lotte has chosen and refined a style that works superbly well for her and it might well be best for you too. You can watch her race here. (Incidentally, Kate Zeigler also used this stroke technique, we call it the Swinger style and it’s used by most elite open water swimmers and triathletes)
Let’s analyse these two great performances and draw some important conclusions for your own swimming:
Absence of Gliding
Sun has an amazingly long stroke, perhaps the longest we’ve ever seen in the elite swimming world. It looks like he’s *gliding* down the pool but be very careful – it’s almost entirely an illusion due to the sheer length of his stroke. Here’s some consecutive frames from his video, 0.04 seconds apart:
The gap between one stroke finishing at the rear and the next starting at the front is less than 0.2 of a second – less than a blink of an eye! The truth is he’s hardly gliding at all – to Sun as he swims his strokes will feel very continuous from one side to the other. The same is true for Grant Hackett (the previous world record holder) – we measured the gap between his strokes as 0.15 seconds.
Although these tall smooth swimmers look like they pause in their stroke and glide down the pool, we can see from the frames above that they don’t. What we perceive when we see this footage at full speed is quite different from the reality. Sun has an extremely long stroke by virtue of his huge wingspan and efficient propulsive technique, this long style creates the perception that he is gliding when in fact there’s only a tiny fraction of a second between strokes.
The Swim Smooth team here in Perth perform thousands of sets of video analysis on swimmers every year. If you are a bit of an Overglider and have tried to lengthen things out by adding an active glide to your stroke, we can tell you from experience that your deadspot will be in the range of 0.6 to 1.2 seconds. This means you’ll be decelerating on every stroke which is losing you a lot of efficiency as you have to re-accelerate on the next stroke. This deadspot between strokes is the key difference between a Smooth Swim Type (of which Sun is a classic example) and an Overglider – other than the fact that a Smooth swims more than twice as quickly of course!
Overgliders need to work on the fluidity and timing of their catch to remove the deadspot in their stroke and so become more efficient. Find out how in our Overglider Swim Type Guide here.
As you’d expect with her faster stroke rate style, Lotte Friis has no gap between propulsion phases at all, starting her stroke at the front just as the stroke is finishing at the back:
This continuous propulsion is what makes the Swinger stroke style so dominant in open water, there’s not even a tiny gap in propulsion to become stalled by wake or chop from other swimmers. Although this style can look like hard work, it isn’t when you get it right and if it suits your physiology. It’s a bit like spinning a smaller gear on the bike – she takes more strokes but each stroke is less effort. You could say she’s Lance Armstrong to Sun’s Jan Ullrich.
If you’re looking to lift your stroke rate remember it’s not a matter of shortening your stroke: we can see from the frame above that Lotte’s still finishing the stroke by her hip and not shortening it at all. Instead, the key is to get into your catch at the front just a little sooner by keeping that lead hand in motion, either extending forwards, tipping over or pressing backwards. Never stopping and actively gliding.
Stroke Timing
The stroke timing of Sun’s and Lotte’s stroke is also worth examining. They both use ‘front-quadrant timing’ which is swimming jargon for the hands passing in front of the head:
his is important as it helps keep the stroke long and gives you support when you go to breathe because the lead arm is out in front of you. If your lead arm collapses down then your hands will pass behind your head and will offer you no support to breath, as we can see with this classic Bambino swimmer:
If you take on water when you breathe, try improving your stroke timing to always have one hand in front of your head at all times. Try repeating the mantra ‘one-two-stretch’ as you swim where the ‘one’ and ‘two’ are on a normal stroke and the ‘stretch’ is on the breathing stroke. This will help you focus on keeping that lead hand out in front of you for support as you breathe, making things feel much more comfortable:
Even though Sun has a very long stroke, he doesn’t catch-up with his hand in front of his head as many Overgliders do. This is critical, a full catch-up style stroke is slow and inefficient because of the very long gap between strokes. Here is such an Overglider, swimming around 2:20 per 100m pace. We measured the gap between his strokes during video analysis as 1.0 seconds, so long he nearly comes to a halt between strokes when he swims:
Both Sun and Lotte tip their wrist at the front of the stroke as they initiate the catch prior to bending and maintaining a high elbow, just as we animated Mr Smooth to do. When watching video clips at full speed this is easy to miss but it’s a key to you initiating a good catch in your own stroke:
Catch Initiation
Remember you’re looking for a light rhythmical feeling to the catch at this point, it’s not a solid feeling until underneath your body during the pull phase. It’s quite likely in your stroke that you over-power things here in front of your head. Even though Sun and Lotte are swimming at maximum effort they’re still keeping their catch light and rhythmical. Find out how to develop a great catch yourself in our Catch Masterclass DVD by clicking here.
By SwimSmooth.com
Most people assume that the Smooth Swim Type is the ideal stroke style. Very tall swimmers like Grant Hackett, Ian Thorpe and Rebecca Addlington epitomise this style – their long strokes setting world records and winning multiple Olympic gold medals.
But, unfortunately, it’s not quite that simple. There is another stroke style that can be just as fast: the refined version of The Swinger. This shorter, punchier style of stroke can be incredibly quick, especially when combined with a two beat kick. Laure Manadou, Kate Ziegler, David Davies and Janet Evans used this style of stroke to win gold medals and set world records in the pool. In fact, at the 2007 World Championships, the women’s 200m, 400m, 800m and 1500m freestyle were all won by Swingers – proof that they can dominate in the pool.
Swimming guru and coach Duane Dobko appeared on live Q&A tonight to answer all your triathlon swimming questions.
Duane Dobko has 17 years of competitive swimming experience and 7 years of triathlon experience. He was a former school record holder for the University of Minnesota in the 100 yard backstroke and was a Canadian National champion in the 50 meter backstroke in 1994. Duane was a 2003 Hawaii Ironman qualifier, finishing 26th in 2002 at Ironman Wisconsin, with the 3rd fastest overall swim split (49:03). Duane is currently swim coaching professional triathlete David Thompson, and competes for the Gear West Elite team out of Minnesota.
Duane has competed and set records in several Minnesota Masters Swimming meets. Duane recently competed at the 2008 USMS Short Course National Championships in Austin Texas where he beat a national record in the 200 Yard Backstroke with a time of 1:49.93.