#front crawl

Children take what adults say literally.  It is one of the reasons I often discourage coaches from being sarcastic in a training session when they attempt to be funny sarcastically.  Swimmers don’t get it.  They think that coaches and adults mean what they say.  Children are influenced by their teachers and the words they use are important.  So why do we call the underwater part of our arm stroke…

Shoulder rotation in Front Crawl is essential.  For a swimmer to be able to get the full benefit from all the muscles that connect the arms to the body they need to rotate their shoulders with their arm stroke. Like the great Russian coach Gennadi Toureski I like to use the analogy of a boat/paddle to have swimmers understand how the arms affect the movement of the body. Toureski called it…

Readers of Joan Cowdroy’s Murder of Lydia may be mystified by a reference to a swimming stroke called the Trudgen. It was known as the racing stroke or the East Indian stroke and owes its origin to John Trudgen who, although born in Poplar in 1852, went out with his parents to Buenos Aires when he was eleven. There he noticed that the local children used an overarm action when swimming rather…

Using a wave-like action is an important skill in swimming. It is useful in quite a number of situations and strokes. If you have ever had the tremendous opportunity to ride a wave, then you will know how exciting it is and what it feels like. To feel the weight of a rising wave gather behind you, pick you up and push you over water is a beautiful feeling. You will accelerate as you are released…