Sunday, March 21, 2010

Not Catching the Drift

Here's a great drill to focus your attention on a high-elbow catch, something that brings you a lot of bang for your buck when it comes to propulsion in swimming. One thing I've noticed in watching most swimmers is that they allow their gliding arm to slowly drift toward the bottom of the pool before their catch. Not only does this add drag and reduce your glide, it also reduces the amount of useful water that you can catch and move behind you. So it's a double-whammy of less glide and less propulsion every time you let your arm drift down. Use this drill and get rid of the drift, you'll see your speed improve!



Here's the rest of Saturday's Master's workout. Whew! I was happy to see my 100 times for the fast ones hover in the range of 1:15 - 1:16, with the fastest being 1:12. That's a 5-second improvement over last week, meaning the arm is still on the upward curve of getting better. This is a workout meant to focus our intensity for our upcoming Master's Association Championships meet in a few weeks. The 2:00 interval allowed everyone in the pool to swim together, which was fun, especially since we had a full house with 4 - 5 people in every lane.

Skill: High Elbow
Drill: Catch-Up Catch – keep elbow on surface of water

Warm Up

300 Swim, alternate free/non-free by 25s
6 x 25 Drill
200 Kick, alt. free/non-free by 25
6 x 25 Drill

4 x 75 Cruise, hard, cruise with good turns



Main Set

21 x 100 @ 2:00

#3, 6 fast
#9, 12 faster
#15, 18 faster still
#21 all out

Other than the fast 100s, the rest are swimmers choice, you can swim other strokes, cruise, or do drills, pulls, or kicking.

100 EZ
6 x 25 Drill
2 x (75 Pull, 75 Kick, 75 Swim, 75 Pull)

100 EZ

Total Yardage: 4150

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