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| Me doing butterfly at a meet |
Swimming consists of four strokes: Butterfly, Backstroke, Breaststroke, and Freestyle (Crawl stroke), and going to practice consistently lets you become better and better at each one. However, getting stronger and having better endurance isn't the only thing that gets you faster. Technique is a big part in swimming. In the swimming world, going to state could really be being a one millisecond to slow. That could mean having your hand straight or flat when you touch the wall, not reaching out while doing freestyle, or even not breathing enough in butterfly. Freestyle and Butterfly and my fastest strokes, but freestyle is everyone's fastest stoke. However, Butterfly sucks and no one really likes it, not even the people who are good at it. It is also pretty complicated, "The relationship of movements of the arms, legs. and torso is precisely coordinated" (Brooks 88). He continues and talks about how your kick and pull is tremendously strong, but you slow down during the recovery (when you bring your arms out of the water and in front of you for another pull). When the legs recover by pushing up your hips go down and when your arms come forward your body goes backwards (88). He gives tips of how to stay low and to drive forward, "We want a fly where every stoke is the same, at the same level, and moves the body the
same distance forward, where the swimmer is breathing or not" (Brooks 91). This season I put in the effort and challenged myself to better myself in the stroke of butterfly. In result, I really do feel smoother and I flow better in the water, when the kick and pull synchronize it is a great feeling.
Have you ever done something when all the parts and components just fit right together and it feels satisfying?
Citation:
Brooks, Michael. Developing Swimmers. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics, 2011. Print.
Hey Sean! It's really crazy how even one millisecond can be too slow. I also swim, and when I swim Butterfly, I struggle with breathing too much. In your post you talk about how the recovery (breathing) is the slowest part of the stroke. How can I minimize my breathing while still putting out all my energy? However I think I do a good job with the rest of my body's movement. Could I modify my stroke where, it's the same speed if I breathe or not? In response to your question, I do love when in butterfly, you get on a roll in the water and you feel like you could swim forever, it is very satisfying.
ReplyDeleteIn my experience, I have swam in the 50 and 100 butterfly. The with goal in butterfly, like mentioned, is to go the same speed, breathing or not. The best way I would say would be staying low in the water while breathing. While at the end of a race I generally get tired and start getting heavy in my stroke, which causes me while breathing to get really high out of the water. Also, breathe in a pattern that is right for the race, in a 50 you would want to breathe less than in a 100 so you would breathe every 5 or 6, but for a 100 my coach advised me to breathe every 3. In longer distance races you would want to breathe more to keep you going at the same pace or else you will get tired a lot faster.
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