Swimming critique

Because of all the motion and lack of clarity it is difficult to see what you are doing. It would be helpful to get a front shot to see if you are crossing the center line on your hand entry, often that is a cause of shoulder issues. The most obvious flaw I can distinguish is you are not keeping your head down, you want to be looking straight down. Lift your elbow higher during recovery, you want to be dragging your fingertips with a relaxed arm. You want to have more glide during your stroke, practice doing catch up to improve your timing so you can refine your stroke more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAkzF7fPWv4&feature=related

Look at TJ's stroke as a comparrison, his hips & kick and lead hand are all in sync. He is getting full extension with his lead hand rotating his hips,his kick is helping drive the rotation. Notice the position of his head, hes looking straight down.

Thanks and I'll try and take another video with better quality from the front and no my logs aren't up to date. I always forget to upload them. 

In regards to the higher elbow that is where the pain happens, the higher I raise it the more it hurts. 

Try more of a glide in your stroke.

Right arm: Hand entry looks good, but slightly crossed over. It dives down pretty fast though.

Left arm: You're rotating into the stroke too early and your whole arm is hitting the water at the same time... OR... you're dropping your elbow and this is just the early indication of it.

And as said earlier, your head is way high.

My shoulder hurting in the deltoid region closer to the front side of my shoulder.  

How do I go about fixing these issues? 

1. Date a hot girl on the swim team.  Free lessons with benefits.

2.  Your right arm crosses over pretty bad.  Can see it even from the side.  Your arm needs to extend out at shoulder width - pretty straight.  That is the most likely reason for the deltoid pain.  Though I get sore in that area from time to time due to volume increases.

3.  Your head is high and is driving your lower end way too low in the water.  Your rear end should be very near the top of the water.

4.  Your feet point down.  Swim with some big flippers that force your ankles to extend out.  Take flippers off and keep doing that.  Your feet in that position really slows you down.

Chris, 

First off, I am not a coach or a Dr. But, in my experience trying to help people out with swimming it is really important to actually be at the pool and be able to give you direct feedback that you can turn around and quickly 'feel' in the water. Reading responses on here and then going to the pool afterwards can make it difficult to remember and honestly, understand. For a non competitive swimmer, or someone without a competitive/history of swimming, it can be difficult to understand some of the swimming lingo. Therefore, I agree with the above post of trying to find someone in your area you can work with. Check around for masters programs which tend to run a little cheaper than trying to get a dedicated coach just for you. Also, you can look into lesson packages at YMCAs or other fitness places. Looks like you have a good size pool to swim at so odds are there is someone there you can throw a few bucks at to help you while you are there. In the long run, it will pay off. 

Also, back in the day when I swam competitively (D1) I would get pain in my shoulders as well when the season would pick up. If you have any build up in your current yardage you will likely develop issues. Just like in running when people jump in to quickly and get shin splints or other over use issues. When I had this issues it usually came down to needing to build up the smaller muscles and ligaments in my arms that don't get worked when I am out of the pool. For me, a very cheap/simple 8 ft length of rubber cord or surgical tubing did the trick. Step on one end and lift your arm in front of you (straight arm from just above your knee to eye level), to the side (same height as to the front), and at a diagonal angle between front and side. Do a few sets of 10-12 reps and you will start to build up those small muscles that are so key to swimming and building your endurance. 

Bottom Line: Try to someone that can help you out at the pool and work on developing the small muscles in your shoulder. 

Good Luck!

Suzanne thank you for your post!!! When I go to the pool later on today I'll be sure to try your suggestions. 

I found the Total Immersion book really cheap on amazon and the library here at school can get me the DVD for free. Hopefully my strokes with improve soon. 

Chris, you got an awesome post relating to technique.  You should send her some $$ paypal!

As for the shoulder I will suggest only 2 things.  If these don't help then you know that you need to stop swimming temporarily if the shoulder gets worse from day to day and especially if it's getting worse throughout a swim workout.

First thing: the high elbow that was suggested is right, but here's why....if your recovery is 'wide' it is bad on the shoulder.  If it's 'narrow' it's better.  Most of the time people just need to be told to lift the elbow and it becomes narrow.  By 'narrow' I mean that the hand stays very close to your body.  Think about running your thumb up the side of your body from thigh up the hip, up the side to your armpit then forward.  That will probably take a lot of strain from the shoulder.

The second thing is to extend your right hand with the thumb pointing toward the ceiling and the pinky down as you reach forward.  That shoulder rotation is easier on the rotator cuff for most people.  It's not how you would probably do the hand entry if you didn't have to, but it can be a good way to mitigate shoulder pain.

And I just thought of a third thing you can do temporarily....breath only to the right side.  A lot of time it's harder on the right shoulder when breathing left.  That is because of a different technique flaw, but I am giving you the simple, quick (and temporary) solution to it.