Breathing during the swim

Good advice

Agree with the exhaling all the way.  In fact, the physical need to breathe is actually the result of not exhaling all the CO2 from the lungs, not the need to get oxygen.  In fact, when I swim (I breathe every strok in 95% of the workout), if my head is underwater, I am exhaling the entire time

Also, there is nothing wrong with breathing every stroke.  Yes, you can gain some benefit by breathing less, but every good swimmer I know, in a hard set (as in a tri), ytou breathe every stroke.  No need to go anaerobic at all.

My .02

Chris

Edited by ChrisM 2005-03-16 2:01 PM

I agree with the 'breathe more' method.  When I first started swimming I always felt out of breath.  I thought the point was to always go as many strokes as possible without breathing.  After consulting several more experienced swimmers, they told me to breathe whenever I needed air.  It worked.

Now I use a very simple breathing exercise where you swim a 100 and each 25 you breath after a certain number of strokes.  Generally, I do a 3/5/3/5.  Which means, the first 25, I breathe every 3 strokes, the second 25 I breathe every 5, etc.  I have also heard that over-unders (or lung-busters) are good too.  You swim underwater for 25 and then swim back freestyle.  Ouch...can't do this one yet!

When I am really trying to swim fast it is not uncommon for me to breathe every other stroke.  I can actually now use my breathing as a pseudo-RPE.

Now if I could just stop feeling out of breath when I flip turn...hmmmm.....