Syncronized Swimming Goldfish

Enjoyed this version of syncronized swimming. Shows goldfish doing the sport as well as any Olympic team. Really! Wish I understood Japanese. Anyone want to translate for me?

Dolphin On-Line Game

Here's a game where you can pretend you're a dolphin. Don't complain. Face it, how many swimming games are there on-line?

Best Video of a Swimmer I've Seen

This is a terrific inspirational video of a triathelete team. Swimmers see the beginning, bikers and runners hang in with it.

Cool Swimming Article

Took my kids to the dentist earlier this week and stumbled across a great swimming article - can't read too much about swimming can we? Check out Outside Magazine's August 2006 issue cover story (yes, a swimming article made the cover of a major magazine - so cool!). It's about two guys who decided swim between a number of islands in the Bahamas with all their possessions in tow on a surf board. Now that's a vacation - and if I had to guess, they probably had all their expenses paid too! Best part, they outdid the guys in the support boat - it sank! (The link above has some info on this story).

Hot Water

It's been hot for the past few weeks and the water temperature in the outdoor pool where I swim has climbed from a comfortable 80 - 82 degrees F. range to as high as 91 (yesterday was 88 and holding - forgot to check this AM). We daily lap swimmers have been having a running battle with the pool admin lady who doesn't seem to appreciate the value of the aerator (pumps out and sprays water into the air so it gets cooled off before returning to the pool). She's come up with an unbelievable number of implausible excuses for not using the unit "Plug doesn't wor" - try the next plug down, it does; "Kids don't like it" - use it when the kids aren't there (5am - 10am), besides they play under the spraying crayons, what's the difference?; "It's broken" - no it's not. What gives? I think it just weighs a ton and her small framed, afraid to raise a finger, first-job teenage lifeguards can't lift it easily (remember, these are the same people hired to save overweight, flailing people who have heart attackes - after all, they are "certified"). Anyhow, I'm just whining here. It happens whenever my workout routine gets compromised. The hot water has put my time off by a whole minute on the mile! Lethargy is the name of my new stroke. Here's hoping for an early Fall.

Autopilot - The Zombie Zone

Over the past two days, I’ve swum pretty hard during my workouts.  Not wanting to set any precedents, I broke the pattern today and took it fairly easy.  Still I think I got a pretty good workout, all things considered.  So if I took it easy, what good did it do?  Well I kept my long muscles primed and I found a zone.  Not the peak zone, but what one might call the zombie zone - the place where you can be working out and find peace.  It was great!  Like meditation.  Typically when I’m really pushing myself, I am focused on the task at hand.  In the “zombie zone,” all focus is elsewhere.  The lap count is forgotten, the task is forgotten, you go into autopilot, yet you are still accomplishing a necessary body exercise and resting your mind.  Like I said before - it’s great!  

Lake Swimming Joy

 

Your Swimming Transmission

This past summer, I’ve had the chance to spend a lot of time swimming longer distances between turns.  I’ve learned to appreciate a dynamic I haven’t thought much about.  Today I was marveling at the amount of work it was taking to get moving out of a flip turn, but once moving, how little effort it took to keep it going once accelerated.  I decided there must be a transmission quality to swimming.  I came to this conclusion after thinking about a radio program on NPR I heard on my drive home, about, of all things, hybrid vehicles.  These vehicles use most of their energy starting.  Once moving they use little.  Swimming is like that.  Drawing on my favorite analogy - the torpedo - once you apply the energy to get started, the momentum keeps you moving forward.  You just have to make sure as little as possible gets in the way of slowing you down once accelerated.  So do this next time you swim laps.  Kick off the wall, put a strong effort into coming up to speed - remember to keep your body torpedo shaped - and then relax and let your pulls and kick keep you at speed.   You can actually relax at this point.  

Open Water vs. Pool Swimming

I've just returned from an annual sojurn to the north country where a favorite past time is - you guessed it sports fans - lake swimming. No change in the hours - wouldn't want to break the routine - so it was up at 6am and hitting the clear waters of a steaming, glassy lake. It's far different than the pool. Positives: Gone were the 85 plus degree morning swims. Hello 75 - 80, perfect; unlimited distance swimming with no walls to break the rhythm - making for excellent opportunity to work on stroke timing; ability to creep up on nature - I enjoyed getting twenty feet from a large blue heron and her now-crow sized hatchlings. Negatives: a little seaweed between my fingers a time or two; opening my eyes under water and seeing large fish pass beneath me; no straight line in the bottom to follow - I lined up the rising sun in my goggles and kept it in the same 1:00 spot (this really works).

Thoughts on Swimmers Pic

I was amazed when I first saw this picture (see previous post).  This shot was taken sometime in what I believe to be the nineteen thirties.  I believe, we found it in among some old heirlooms that had been stored away (I’ve had it a while, so I can’t be certain).  My first impression was the animation of the people.  They’re not staring blankly into the camera like so many old timey pictures do.  Must be having too much fun swimming.  Check out the swim suit designs.  The two-piece (left most) was a complete surprise - ahead of its time?  And the one-side moon shaped cut out on the woman’s suit is pretty radical.  Also those white swim goggles.  They are so cool!

Cool Good Ole Days Swimmers

 

Swim Suit Analytics

OK, this AM I wore the skimpy speed suit. I wanted to get a comparison to yesterday's horrible performance when I wore the drag suit. Today I dropped my time for the same distance by 104 seconds or 5.78 percent just by using a suit that slips through the water easier. Now I know why those swimmers shave their heads before a race! Sorry, I'm not planning an analysis of those low belly cut suits in this blog :0

Swim Suit Choice Revisited

I want to revisit a topic which I am finding more important than I ever could have imagined - swim suit choice.  It really is one of the most important factors you can make for any swimmer, beginner to expert.  I’ll start with my main premise.  You want a suit that is hydrodynamic (like an airplane is aerodynamic), meaning it flows through the water with little encumbrance.  If you must fight through the water to get anywhere, you are going to where yourself out - unless that’s your goal (for fitness purposes).  My aha moment came this morning during my workout.  Generally I can complete the first part of my workout in less than 30 minutes.  Today, it took a full minute more to go the same distance.  Now that doesn’t sound like a lot, but let me add - I was pulling harder than ever (my lane was parallel to the swim team lane and I was “trying” to keep up - they were future Olympians I imagine. Ha ha).  To add to that, my foot which I hurt about a week ago was finally healed, so I could kick well for the first time since the injury. If anything, I should have shaved time off this part of my workout. So what’s with the extra time?  A loose fitting, hip length drag suit was the culprit.  I didn’t buy it for its intended purpose - I was just trying to find something that didn’t make me look like a model for some skin magazine.  It held the water and prevented me from getting any results from my efforts to glide.  Perhaps the drag suit helps me build strength, but it did nothing for my pride.  My suggestions?  If you want speed and distance, go for the streamlined thigh huggers or the tight briefs (if your ego can stand it).  Dump them in the waste basket as soon as they start poofing out from age and get a new pair.  You’ll get better swimming results, I promise.

Anyone Can Swim

 

Pointing Elbows

I must apologize for my artwork (see previous post).  Also, please note this post is about freestyle arm movement - not kicking.  I realize the pictures have the legs in the same position throughout.  OK, I’m accused of not kicking much, so I suppose it’s accurate.  Anyhoo, the drawing isn’t of me either - yet it sort of looks like it might be.  Too weird.  
Well, I wanted to talk about pointing your elbows.  If you look at the top drawing and then at the picture (closely, maybe with a magnifying glass), you’ll see two demonstrations of pointing your elbow at the sky as you come out of your pull and go into your stretch.  Try to scratch the sky with your elbow, i.e. make your arm come out of the water in a vertical position (or rather perpendicular to the water’s surface) - sort of like a shark fin.

Elbows To Sky + Straight Arm Pull

My Favorite 50 Meters

 

Arm Entry

How you put your arms in the water when you do the freestyle can be a big deal. Do it wrong and you impede your progress. Do it right and you can actually make yourself go faster. Watch different people do freestyle. Watch how some will put their arms in the water with their elbows sticking out to the side and their hands coming across the front of their heads. These people are in effect putting up a barrier in front of them each time each arm enters the water. Of course, this slows down waterever benefit they may have gotten from their previous pull and from their kick. Look for the people who are doing the stroke correctly. They put their hands in the water straight in front of them. Doing so creates no resistance to water flow and they get into position to pull the water just as fast. They even set themselves up for a longer pull - and a longer pull means you go futher with each stroke. Try it!

Be Happy - Swim

I've noticed when I'm getting to the pool in the morning - about 6:30am - there is a bunch of people leaving who are happier than any other group I meet all day. It's the Masters swim group. They get there at the crack of dawn. Why are they happy? I've had my theories - including it's because their work-out is over. But even the stray person I see when I'm done with my workout - we late risers don't finish as a group - are also pretty content. I came across this article today which talks about the psychological benefits of exercise. Nice read. Enjoy.

Wasted Motion Means Wasted Energy

When I watch a novice adult swimmer, I am often amazed at all the effort that is being used -with no positive effect. Often the splash is huge, the waves large and the forward momentum near zero. What's wrong? Well I've already mentioned the torpedo profile at least a dozen times in this blog. Maintaining that profile is half the battle. It allows you to cut through the water and let it slide past with ease. So what's up with the thrashing arms and legs you see so many people using? It's total waste of motion and energy. The motion is not being applied appropriately. Swimming in a nutshell is a case of levers and fulcrums along with thrusts, pulls and pushes - each applied properly. The problem isn't just with novice swimmers. Even good swimmers could use a little "skinny swimming" - this is a term I picked up from a woman who was happy to share a lane with me one day when all the other lanes were full. She said she would practice her "skinny swimming." In essense, skinny swimming is deliberate swimming whereby you keep your arms straight ahead and along side your body while your legs stretch out behind. You do this, maintaining a profile as close to an arrow as possible. No wasted motion. Don't swing your arms out (like an eagle), or even straight up (like a windmill). What's the point? You aren't pulling anything but air if your arms are far out of the water. It may look cool, but you are only fooling yourself. Arms that stretch out of the water more than an inch or two are just using energy to fight gravity - that's all. Use that effort and apply it once you've reached the topmost point of your stretch, then apply it to a stronger, longer pull through the water.