10 swimming myths....busted

1stTimeTri - 2010-05-10 5:21 PM While swimming, does flatulating propel you faster through water?

Steve314 - 2010-05-10 9:55 PM Myth #1.1 

Putting spacing in long paragraphs makes them less readable.

Looking forward to your other thoughts, but please - use that enter key! 

Gaarryy - 2010-05-10 10:08 PM



 hmm..considering who he is and what he has accomplished in swimming .  I think I'm willing to cut him some slack..

Three-time Olympian Gary Hall, Sr. (1968, '72, '76) set 10 world records in his career and earned three Olympic medals: two silvers and a bronze. Hall, who also set 23 American records, carried the U.S. flag at the 1976 Games, for which he trained while attending medical school. His son, Gary Hall, Jr., also is a three-time Olympic swimmer.

garyhallsr - 2010-05-10 9:11 PM Here I go again, stirring up the pot. But I love debunking some of the (unfortunately) common teaching going on in swimming...particularly when it is plain ol' wrong.

Myth #1 To go faster in swimming one must push out the back of the arm pull

I believe this myth may have originated with an article that appeared some time in the 90's. The article showed a swimming figure mimicking Alex Popov's freestyle pull. It showed the figure with the left arm in front and the the right arm in back ready to exit the water for the recovery. A graph showed the velocity of Popov's body in the water as a function of the position of the hand. The velocity ranged from nearly 3 meters per second down to about 1.4 meters per second during a single pull cycle. The slowest speed occurred when the hand appeared to be at around the shoulder and the fastest speed occurred in the position shown in the figure. The author erroneously concluded that since the speed was so high as the right hand was about to exit, that this is where the most power must be....hence push out the back. My study with the velocity meter doing freestyle concurs that it is these two positions that consistently show the highest and lowest velocities of the stroke cycle in freestyle (though I was seeing more like a 30 to 40% drop, not 50%). But it is not because of the power out the back that we see the speed highest in this position. It is because it is by far the position of least drag (most streamlined). The propulsive power in this position actually is derived mostly from the left arm out in front and the kick, with little or no power coming from the end of the arm pull. The propulsive power may be even greater when we see the hand at the shoulder (slowest body speed), but because the arm is jetting straight out, perpendicular to the body, the drag coefficient skyrockets and our speed drops instantly. The harm that is done by pushing out the back is that it delays the recovery and slows the stroke rate. Most of the arm propulsive power is derived from the entry to the shoulder (called the front quadrant....about 1/2 of the total arm cycle time is spent there). So the sooner one can get the hand back to the front quadrant after leaving the shoulder, the better. If you happened to be blessed with Mercury motors for legs, like Michael Phelps, Ian Thorpe, Gary Jr, Natalie Coughlin etc, then you can afford to use a slower stroke rate...but hold in front, not in back. For the rest of us mortals, keep your arms moving faster and in the front quadrant. Think you can't do that for 2 1/2 miles, think again. Lot's of distance swimmers use high arm stroke rates. You just have to train that way and get fit.

Regards,

Gary Sr

camaleon - 2010-05-11 8:36 AM

tealeaf - 2010-05-11 7:38 AM

Or, perhaps we be appreciative that an Olympian is taking time to post on BT.

GorgeousGeorge - 2010-05-11 9:40 AM

This
I don't care what it looks like, the gold nuggets from people like that are the reason I read this board.  If he wanted to exclude spaces and periods too, fine by me.

blairrob - 2010-05-11 7:54 AM

      You forgot the period after "This".

 

GorgeousGeorge - 2010-05-11 9:57 AM  Obviously, my grammer is on par with my swimming.  I have trouble finishing the stroke.  However,  that is not what she said.

bryancd - 2010-05-11 9:32 AM When swimming ofr pace, my hand usually begins to exit the water for the recovery just past my hip as opposed to my mid-thigh, shortening the pull and returning to the front more quickly. Is there an ideal point of exit or is that swimmer dependent?