The fins can help develop the ankle flexibility and strength more quickly to allow for a decent kick, but that alone doesn't mean you will have a good kick. Still have to kick without the fins to get the motion right.

That sounds more like a body position issue than ankle flexibility. You may still need to work on the flexibility, but the pull buoy assists in getting your body into the right position. Namely lifting your legs up.

I wasn't able to bring that link up but I found another one. They perform three drills I think it is the second drill they perform. Can you confirm that this is the correct drill that was reference in the thread earlier. Thanks.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPl2iXwbuA8

Yeppers!  Ok can't figure out how to embed the video, but here is the isport channel description from you tube : 

Freestyle Swimming Drills: Side Balance

It is about 5 minutes long, but it has an amazing underwater view of the position.    

Video of this drill please.  I am a pretty advanced swimmer (10 years competitive), and swimming feels pretty natural to me, but want to see if there are little things I can work on to get even faster.  I am having a hard time picturing what you described.  I want to break 1 hour at my Ironman in August.    

I've seen lots of runners with "runner's kick", where their toes point down instead of backwards, and each kick drags them backwards... even with solid body position. 

A lot of those folks got better by doing drills with flippers... just for ankle flexibility. 

I would trust your coach on this. I'm sure there are other things wrong with your stroke that need to be worked on. However, working on a stroke is like untying a knot. You can start with any string, but if you quite half way, you won't loosen up enough for other strings to work. So keep pulling on this thread of pointing your toes for a few weeks, and then you can try something different once this has worked its course. Don't try too many things at the same time. 

There are no tricks around this. Having a wetsuit will not help the fact that your kick makes you backwards. You just have to teach your ankles to relax and allow your feet to point backwards.  

Thank you for posting this video.  I am a very experienced swimmer, and I rotate, but after watching this - I am thinking I don't rotate enough.  Can't wait to try some of these drills and see how it feels.  

wish I knew what to tell you.  my kick is useless too (not good to hear from a former lifeguard).  I basically point my toes and kick just enought to keep my legs afloat--it does nothing to help my forward momentum.  keep practicing with the bouy and work on pointing your toes--you don't need the legs to complete the swim--you'll be saving them for the other 2 sections :-)

That is the main purpose of the kick.  Propulsion provided by kicking is minimal.  The only swimmers that have a furious kick, for propulsion purposes, are Olympic level swimmers that are competing at the shorter distances.  The amount of energy used to kick really fast for propulsion is not worth it for long distance swimmers / triathletes.

Thanks for reposting and I was able to view it. A picture is worth a thousand words or a video clip in this case. Thanks again.