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These articles are not intended to be a substitute for medical care. If you are concerned about a particular medical condition or injury, please see your health care provider for evaluation and care.
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May 15, 2012
Teaching Triathletes to Catch
By Coach Sue Sotir, Minuteman Masters
Triathletes offer an interesting combination of challenges for masters swim coaches. We must always coach the individual in front of us, but, as a group, triathletes share some common characteristics. Many triathletes believe that more effort will lead to more speed, which works on land but in the water, is not always true. In addition, they often come to us with good lungs, low shoulder and ankle flexibility, a preconceived notion of what swimming looks like, little to no “feel” for the water, and an impending goal race where they want to be ready to attack the swim. How can we, as coaches, overcome previous misconceptions and accelerate technique development? We can get quicker results by increasing feedback.
May 8, 2012
Treading the Thin Line of Death
By Coach Emmett Hines
Instinct rarely serves you well in swimming. The human survival impulse in water screams, “Get head above water! Get vertical! Get out!” For the majority of swimmers, despite having quelled most of these primal urges, the “need” to lift the head, if only a wee bit in order to breathe, still remains.
April 19, 2012
Teaching Hand Pitch with Scull Drills
By Coach Cokie Lepinski, Swymnut Masters
I’m a coach and a swimmer. As I swim my workouts, I’m constantly reflecting on how something feels, and how to best relay that feeling to my swimmers. Recently, my thoughts have been focused on hand pitch. The pitch of our hands is essential to all four strokes, and even starts and turns, but conveying the hows and whys to our swimmers can be challenging.
For developing knowledge and understanding of the importance of the hands, I have always loved sculling as a method to teach feel for the water. Because swimmers respond differently to verbal or visual clues, it may take different words, visuals, or demonstrations to reach them. You can say something to 10 swimmers and not all will get the concept, or they might understand it but have problems applying it.
March 16, 2012
T'ai Chi Swimming
By Coach Emmett Hines
As I pass a park near my home there is often a group of retirement community residents practicing T'ai Chi. Precise movements, full ranges of motion, impeccable balance—all demonstrated as though someone pushed the slow-mo button on the VCR. As a student of human motion, what strikes me is that such execution of complex actions requires mastery of posture, balance and precise motion as well as complete mindfulness and highly concentrated focus at all points throughout the activity. Since the participant does not move quickly from one position to the next, there is no opportunity to gloss past parts of the activity where balance and/or position are iffy.
February 17, 2012
1-2-3 Streamlines
By Scott Bay, Coaches Committee Chair
For competitive swimmers, one of the biggest areas of opportunity for improvement is in streamlines, transitions and breakouts. An effective way to coach this technique is to break it down into three parts, teach each component, and then work on putting the whole thing together. Make adjustments to everything based on the athlete who is in the water.
January 5, 2012
Three Critical Technique Differences When Swimming in a Wetsuit
By Coach Michael Collins, Nova Masters Swimming & Multisports Orange County
I ask every triathlete I coach, “How do you change your stroke when you swim in a wetsuit?” Few ever get the answer right. The say things like “Uh, well I float better so I don’t kick at all.” I rarely get much beyond the mention of the increased buoyancy and using the legs less or not at all.
October 31, 2011
The Short Breaststroke Pullout
By Luca De Matteis
The breaststroke pullout consists of three phases: the glide phase, the pull-down phase, and the recovery/kick phase. Properly executed, the phases of the pullout are combined to produce maximum efficiency and speed. The long pullout has been the traditional way to begin each length. However, it is not the only form of pullout.
August 18, 2011
Underwater Video Analysis: Which Camera is Right for You?
By Ben Christoffel
A swimming program that invests in an underwater video system has many options. Swimming stroke technique can be analyzed, allowing coaches and athletes to watch arm and leg position, body rotation and presence of air. Turns and starts can be analyzed, watching for streamlined body position and improvements to increase speed. Learn-to-swim programs benefit from allowing new swimmers to compare their strokes to video of accomplished swimmers. Below are a few options to consider when purchasing an underwater camera.
November 26, 2010
A-lign-ment
By Coach Hermine Terhorst, Santa Rosa Masters
Alignment, AKA: a lign ment, AKA: I Ment to be in A Lign
The coolest thing about being a Masters coach is the diversity of swimmers that you coach in any workout. From the beginners in lane one to swimmers who have spent their entire lives coming to workouts in lane 5.
From the deck the most obvious difference between lane 1 and 5 is alignment. If Michael Phelps is the 100% bar, than a typical masters elite lane would be 70-85%, intermediate 60-70%, beginner/intermediate 40-60%, beginner 0-40%. No matter the motivation to train a swimmer should always be looking to increase their percentage of good alignment. It does not take more fitness to go faster, it takes less drag! Bad alignment = drag.
February 22, 2010
Free/Back Combo Drill
By Kerry O'Brien, Walnut Creek Masters
This Free/Back Combo Drill is a drill that anyone can incorporate into their training. We’ve mentioned time and time again the importance of head position and body alignment and this drill focuses on both of these elements as it transitions between freestyle based and backstroke based swimming. You can use this drill during your warm up or cool down before or after a backstroke set and is great for triathletes as an opportunity to “take a break” from the typical all-freestyle triathlon workout. This drill can be swum short course or long course.
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