Timing Is Everything: Nail Your Kick Timing For a Better Distance Swim

Swim coaches love to talk about what your hips are doing in the water. They're under-rotating, over-rotating, sliding from side to side. Very few people talk about the timing of what your feet are doing, yet the timing of your kick drives your hip rotation and affects your entire stroke. Proper hip rotation and therefore proper core engagement and therefore proper power in the swim stroke are all connected to kick timing, and without it, no amount of isolated hip motion is going to help. Improper kick timing usually causes a visible over-rotation of the hips, and can really only be solved by correcting the kick timing.

If you contrast the photo of the swimmer above, taken from GoSwim.tv's excellent video with the photos below of swimmers I found on various underwater videos on Youtube, you'll see the difference that the correct kick timing makes on hip position and rotation. The swimmer above has timed the downbeat of her kick with the extension of her opposite arm. Her hips are stable in the water, with power clearly coming from the twisting of the torso. The swimmers below are timing their downbeat kick with the arm on the same side of their body, causing an over-rotation of the hips and hence an under-utilization of the power of the torso in their stroke.

Here's an example from another angle. In this photo, you see Olympic medalist Ian Thorpe, the downbeat of his left leg clearly corresponding with the extension of his right arm, his hips very stable and not over-rotating or dipping down in the water.

Versus this swimmer whose left kick is accompanying his left arm stroke instead, thus causing his left hip to dip way down and creating a situation where he can't use the rotation of his torso for power in his stroke.

Kick timing can also be diffficult to work on. Some people get it instinctively, but for others it takes a lot of work. Your timing is often indelibly stamped in your brain-muscle connections and it takes hard work to re-wire that.

For triathletes and lap swimmers trying to improve their body position, their core rotation, hip position, and the power of their stroke, kick timing is an essential skill to work on. I will try to explain proper kick timing here and how I go about helping people achieve it.

It will help if, as people read this, they go back and watch this video with the proper timing as that gives a visual reference to the whole thing:


First, some basics. There are three main types of kicks that we use in the crawl stroke.

#1: Two-beat kick: One beat for each arm stroke. This is used primarily for distance swimming and is the most effective kick you can use with the least amount of effort. A good two-beat kick will keep your hips up for good body position, and will drive the correct core rotation to engage your major core muscle groups to power your stroke. In a two-beat kick, the downward extension of the kicking leg corresponds to driving the gliding arm into its full extension. I like to think of it as drawing an "X" across my body, stabilizing my hips and preventing them from over-rotation. If done right, you will feel this downbeat of the kick powering your arm into that glide. Re-watch the video  and look at the pause-point where her leg is at full extension of the downstroke and the opposite arm is at full extension. Although the swimmer in the video is using a six-beat, not a two-beat kick, you can still see what I mean about the timing of the primary downbeat kick.

#2: Six-beat kick: Three beats for each arm stroke. You will still have the downbeat kick in exactly the same place as it was in the two-beat kick, which is to say powering the opposite arm into full extension. The other two beats come in between the downbeats. So it sounds a bit like a waltz, with a feeling of 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3. Again, the downbeat kick is the primary driver of the core rotation, and prevents over-rotation of the hips. The additional kicks are in there to provide power for swimming at faster speeds. As you pick up speed, the primary kick stays the same, but the secondary kicks pick up more and more power. Of course, with this power comes increased oxygen consumption, so by the time you reach a full-on six-beat kick, you're going to be sucking up more oxygen than you would want to for distance swimming. The swimmer in the video clip I posted is using a six-beat kick. Many distance swimmers use a modified six-beat kick with a heavy two-beat downstroke and very light secondary kicks.

#3: Kick like hell. This is what you do when you sprint. Unfortunately, all too many triathletes use this option for regular lap swimming, thus eating up their precious oxygen supply. If you are kicking more than 3 beats per arm stroke, you are kicking TOO MUCH. A video analysis will show you how many kicks you're getting in there. Many swimmers kick 4 beats per arm stroke (an 8-beat kick) which has the unfortunate side-effect of having the downbeat kick coincide with the opposite arm half the time (good) but with the same arm the other half of the time (bad). You can spot these swimmers a mile away by the drunken-sailor-like roll that they swim with. One hip consistently dips down while the other stays stable.

HOW TO CHANGE YOUR KICK TIMING:

When I work with swimmers on kick timing, I usually have them start with a pull-buoy. The reason is that if I don't, their regular kicking pattern will quickly re-establish itself. Also, it removes the need to have to kick hard to keep the hips up. I will also note that it helps to have some good basic body-positioning stuff down in order to work on kick timing (head down instead of up, front arm gliding instead of pushing down on the water, kick is efficient without too much knee bend or "bicycling" of the legs).

With a pull buoy, you can start to work on the timing of the downbeat kick. You can work on just one leg at a time. Get a good pulling rhythm going with your arms, and then try to insert just a left leg downbeat kick to coincide with the right arm's extension. Then work on the right leg-left arm combination. Then you can work on both. Then work on eliminating the pull buoy. When the two-beat rhythm clicks, it should feel like each downbeat kick is driving your opposite arm into the glide. Once you get a two-beat kick down, it's not as hard to add in the other 4 kicks to make up a six-beat kick.

What Does Chocolate Cake Have to Do With Swimming Efficiently?

My swimmers are always accusing me of using food metaphors. Gee, I wonder why that is? In today's drill, I was having them focus on using the hand and arm efficiently to catch water, using the HVF (High Vertical Forearm) drill from GoSwim.Tv .

One reason that I like this drill is that it can be done slowly and allows you to isolate and concentrate on just this one aspect of your stroke. I've also used a variation on this drill to help people learn the breaststroke catch. When swimming breaststroke, a lot of swimmers use what I call a "keyhole" stroke: they bring both arms out to the sides, then curve back together and then push them down toward their thighs, making the shape of a keyhole. In reality, the breaststroke hands should catch and move outwards slightly and back, then "turn the corner" and come back together to push out into the glide. Your elbows should never travel back behind your shoulders. So this HVF freestyle drill can be done with a more breaststroke-like pull in order to remind swimmers to return their hands to the front without pushing back and down.

What does that have to do with chocolate cake you might ask? I call this drill "scraping the inside of the bowl", which would be a bowl filled with chocolate cake batter of course. You wouldn't want to leave the last bit of chocolate cake batter in the bowl, so you use your arm to go around the inside of the bowl and get it all out. At least, that's how I see it in my head, but I admit that visions of chocolate frequently percolate to the top of my thoughts so you can visualize anything you want in the bowl.

You can see what I mean if you watch this video:

Sandwich Swim

Here's Saturday's Masters workout:

Skill: Early Catch
Drill: Shoulder-Catch

You can see this drill in action here

Warm Up

2 X (100 Swim, 100 Kick, 100 Pull
100: Cheek-to-shoulder
6 x 25: Shoulder-Catch: Start your pull prior to allowing your shoulder to break contact with your cheek)

4 X 75 Powerup: Keep early catch



Main Set

6 x 150 stroke sandwich (50 free, 50 stroke IM order, 50 free) @ 2:30

8 x 75 Kick Sandwich 25 Swim EZ, 25 Kick Moderate, 25 Swim Fast @ 1:30

4 x 100 Dolphin Sandwich: Underwater Dolphin 12 yards, sprint to end of pool, Moderate 50, Underwater Dolphin 12 yards then sprint to end @ 2:00

3 x 200 Pull Sandwich 50 Swim, 100 Pull, 50 Swim: Hold your lowest Stroke Count throughout

100 EZ



Total Yardage: 4000

SWEET Misery

I have to love it when one of my swimmers tells me a workout has made it into his "Top 10 hardest ever" list, and today's was just such a workout. I can't believe they were giving me grief for coming up with this workout and not being able to swim it with them. I know it's a toughie, but dang it I'd much rather be in the pool busting my ass than not.

Lately I've been working with my Masters on swimming straight, something that almost all swimmers from the slow lane to the smoking fast struggle with. Last week's drill was a Blind Swim. I had the swimmer start 10 seconds apart, just doing one length at a time. The idea is to swim as long as you can with your eyes closed and NOT crash into the lane lines. Swimmers were all over the place, it looked like the freeway at about 3 am on New Year's morn out there. Crazy! Watch someone swim blind and all the faults of the stroke become much more instantly apparent. When we have that lovely black line on the bottom of the pool to follow, we constantly self-correct without even knowing that we're doing it.

Today's drill was designed to piggy-back on top of that experience and help straighten everyone out. We started off with some Superman Kick, which is my name for kicking on your front with your arms extended straight out in front of your shoulders (head down) just like Superman.

Not like this Superman, that's more like a closed-fist drill, though I have to say the body alignment is nice and straight, even if the head is too high...

And not like this Superman either, I think he's doing the butterfly or something...




Here's the Superman I was looking for, though again ignore the closed fists and the head looking up. Nice straight body, arms straight out in front of the shoulders, and hands should be pointed just slightly down so fingers aren't poking out of the water.

From the Superman kick, we went on to Superman catch-up, which is just like the normal catch-up drill except with the arms in the Superman position. Why, you might ask? Well, often when we aim for having our hands meet in the middle or enter the water right on our centerline, what we actually do when swimming is to cross over that center line, often substantially. This gives a wiggle to the stroke that incurs monumental drag and wastes a lot of our energy. By practicing the catch-up drill with the hands meeting in the middle, we can inadvertently reinforce this poor hand entry position. So I've been working on catch-up in the Superman position and I think it's helpful to get that hand-entry more in line with the shoulders, especially because when you swim if you think your hands are in line with your shoulders, chances are they're closer to your center line. If you think they're at the center line, chances are that they're crossing over it.

Here's the rest of the workout, "SWEET 16" (I heard through the grumbling that the main set was a b*tch!) On the main set, every even 150 is timed. They are swum at 90% effort, and the idea is to keep the times within a few seconds of each other throughout the main set. Odds are described below. The interval should give plenty of time for rest.

=================

Skill: Parallel Hand Entry
Drill: Superman Catch-up

Warm Up

2 x (200 Swim
6 x 75: Superman kick, Superman Catch-up, Swim by 25s)

1300

Main Set


SWim
Every
Even
Timed

16

16 x 150, 90% effort @ 3:00

Evens: Timed
Odds:
1 – 4 Easy
2 – 8 No Free IM by 25s
9 – 12 Pull
13 – 16 Dr/Swim by 25s

3700

6 x 25 Dolphin kick to halfway, then swim
150 EZ



Total Yardage: 4000

Avoid the Slosh Zone

Something occurred to me while swimming with the Masters this Saturday. For one thing, I got thrown to the wolves... er.... swam in the fast lane. So I got an opportunity to watch the fastest of the fast guys up close. Even when swimming a workout, I'm always observing what the other swimmers are doing, both good and bad. Sometimes my underwater perspective helps me coach them differently than I do when I'm just coaching from the deck. Anyways, we did a really fun workout (fun as defined by "really hard work that was kinda cool") called "Rush Hour". We did 4 sets of 250 yards with 4 swimmers in a lane. The first swimmer takes off, followed closely by the 2nd and 3rd swimmers, all swimming at a moderate-to-easy pace. The 4th swimmer has to sprint by all of them and reach the wall, execute a good strong turn and glide out in front of them to lead the next lap. Repeat with the new 4th swimmer sprinting so that each 4 lengths you are sprinting and the other three recovering. It really gives you some motivation to put on a good strong sprint when you have to get by all of your lane mates.

So what I noticed was that the fastest swimmers were able to move past me without my feeling anything until their feet were ahead of my shoulders. In other words, they had no sideways slosh from their stroke, none of their energy was being used to move water in directions that did not propel them forwards. From swimmers in other lanes to my sides who are not as efficient, I was feeling moderate to severe sloshing, meaning that some of the energy in their stroke was being used to push water sideways. In some cases, this was due to inefficiencies in the pull phase of their stroke, in others it was due to that sideways frog-kick that some swimmers give every few kicks, especially when breathing (the body naturally seeks to stabilize itself by turning your legs into water-skipper legs and reaching out to the sides).

In order to swim our fastest and most efficiently, we have to work diligently to reduce the slosh effect, to direct all of our energy to moving water behind us only. So if you go and swim, visualize yourself moving past an object. How is the water that you're moving affecting that object? Does it reach the object before you do? Some people's hand entry actually pushes some water forward, if the hands are not slicing neatly into the water. Are you splashing the lane beside you as your elbow drops on entry, creating a big sploosh with each stroke? Are you pushing water sideways underwater with your pull? Is your kick inadvertantly moving water down or sideways?

Sometimes in the summer, if I'm lucky enough to get an outdoor lane all to myself and the sun overhead, I can see the shadow created by the water ripples that I am moving. Ideally, this shadow looks like the triangular wake of a boat stretching out behind me, but I'm alert to any ripples or eddies that are extending from my sides. This is a great feedback mechanism if/when you have access to observe yourself like this. You can also ask a friend to watch from above if you have a calm moment when the pool opens and the lanes are empty.

Here's the whole workout from this Saturday:


Skill: Forearm Catch
Drill: Closed Fist

Warmup:
250 Swim
4 x 75: 50 Closed Fist, 25 Open
200 Swim
4 x 75 Kick, Build Each
150 Swim

======

1 x 250 Pull, work Distance per Stroke

2 x 50 Swim Golf (score is time in seconds plus total strokes)

3 x 200 Desc. @ 3:15

4 x 250 m M. Rush Hour (last in line sprints to start each lap) @ :30 rest

5 x 25-50-75 5 sec. rest @ 1:20 pace (2:15 for each total set, with rest)

6 x 50 Cooling Down

4200 y

Doing the Deck Work

I'm having fun with creative swim workouts lately, and this week was no exception: a new Crossfit-inspired swim workout that I think left everyone feeling taxed in new and unexpected ways. Give it a try if you are tired of just plain old yardage that's not getting you anywhere and want to really feel tapped to your last muscle fiber!


First of all, I'm doing something new with the Master's swimmers. Each week focusing on a certain skill with one specific drill to target it. This week's skill was the High-Elbow Catch, meaning that you shouldn't drop your elbow at any point in the underwater progression from catch to exit. The reasoning is this (try this at home if you don't believe me): as soon as you drop your elbow, you've placed all of your propulsive power in your arm muscles, mostly biceps. Keep your elbow high and you've moved it to the much bigger muscle groupings in your back - especially the lats. The drill for this is the "surfboard" drill - swim like you're paddling a surfboard. No glide portion, just a high elbow catch as if there's a surfboard underneath you. Yes, this is a big exaggeration, but it should give you the feeling of where your catch should be coming from.

Warm Up
300 Drill/Swim by 25s, 100 Kick on Back, 300 Pull, 100 Kick on Side
300 Swim, 100 Kick on Front

1200 y


Main Set

3 x 200 Desc. @ 3:15 (fastest one should be med-fast, we're getting warmed up for the really hard stuff to come)

25 then get out of the water and do 10 pushups, or alternatively do pool pushups from underwater to straight arms on the side of the pool)
50 + 10 pushups
75 + 10 pushups
100 + 10 pushups

50 EZ
2100 y

3 x 150 Desc. @ 2:30 (again, fastest should not be all out but should be med-fast)

25 + 10 pushups
50 + 10 pushups
75 + 10 pushups
100 + 10 pushups

3 x 100 Desc.

50 EZ


5 x 50 Get long – lower stroke count each

3400 y

Tabata Swim

If you've never heard of the Tabata Protocol, here's a great little article from Men's Fitness Magazine that explains the basics and a little bit of the history. Crossfit utilizes Tabata intervals in their workouts, and originally the Tabata Protocol was developed for speed skaters, but very few triathletes I know have ever heard of them. I did find an article on Active.com's triathlon section on utilizing Tabata intervals with a bike trainer, which is a good way to ease into trying Tabata, if such a grueling workout could ever be "eased" into. Though it only lasts 4 minutes, the puke-factor is really high with this workout. It's Intense, with the capital "I".

The Tabata basics: 6 - 8 intervals consisting of 20 seconds going ALL OUT followed by only 10 seconds of rest. Yeah, it's a killer. But Izumi Tabata, Ph.D., a researcher at Japan's National Institute of Fitness and Sports studied the effects of this workout and discovered that not only are those 4 little minutes of extreme workout effort and minimal rest better than traditional intervals (with their 1:3 workout-to-rest ratio), it's better than aerobic conditioning itself at improving your aerobic condition.

I decided to try to have a little fun with Tabata intervals in the pool and my Master's swimmers this week. Whenever I decide to unleash something new and different on them, I always try it out myself first (see, I'm not totally heartless), so I did this workout myself last week, and with my Master's folks on Saturday. Tabata intervals lend themselves pretty easily to most sports, everything from bodyweight exercises to punching bag workouts to running on the track can be done Tabata-style. But swimming is a little different because it's hard to stop quickly and you have to keep turning around. With 4 - 5 swimmers in a lane, logistics were the hardest thing to overcome in planning this workout.

What I decided to do was just have each swimmer start in a different part of the lane, and have everybody circle-swim. I was the whistle-blower for the 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off routine. Now with swimming, I wouldn't try this workout unless your technique is already good. The main reason is that speed and endurance in swimming, unlike almost every other exercise you might do, is about 90% good technique. So swimming Tabatas with poor technique might improve your aerobic conditioning, but it also might make you slower in the pool. If you're already a reasonably good swimmer though, give this one a go.

In the warmup of this workout, and the earlier intervals, focus hard on good, good, good form. That way when you get to the Tabatas, you're set up to keep form and add power.

===========

Tabata Swim

Warmup: 8 x 100 Odd Free, Even Choice
4 x 75 25 Drill, 50 Swim
2 x 100 Powerup
50 Swim Golf

-------------

6 x 200 Desc. x 3 Int. = 1st 200 + 15 s.
6 x 100 Desc. x 3 Int = 1st 100 + 1- s.


-------------

Tabata Swim x 8
Tabata Kick x 8
Tabata Pull x 8
Tabata Swim x 8


150 Cool

4150 Yards

Feeling Lucky??

Here's the Master's Workout I wrote up for today. It's one of those deceptively hard ones. I'll write out the workout and then give you the blow-by-blow. If you do this one right and you're not wiped by the end of it, you're one tough cookie!

"Lucky Sevens"

Warmup:
7 x 125 - Odds Swim, Evens Alternate Drill/Swim by 25
25 EZ

7 x 75 - 50 Kick, 25 swim
25 EZ

==========
Main Set:

7 x 175: 1, 2 Cruise
3, 4 Build
5 - 7 Descend
25 EZ

7 x (25 Stroke, 25 all-out sprint)

7 x 125 : 100 Pull, 25 Scull
25 EZ

============
Cool Down:
7 x 25 Cruise
25 EZ

Total: 4150 yards


How to work it:

7 x 125 - Odds Swim, Evens Alternate Drill/Swim by 25

Really concentrate on your drills on this warmup set. Each time you swim after doing a particular drill, focus on that aspect of your stroke during the swim. Put your brain to it.

7 x 75 - 50 Kick, 25 swim

Work the kick to start warming up your legs. Focus on kicking from the hips. Do some of the kick on your back and make sure you don't have "popcorn knees" (knees popping out of the water). Do some of the kicking on your side in a streamlined position with one hand straight ahead and one hand trailing behind you. By the last couple 75s, your kick should be moderately hard in effort.

7 x 175: 1, 2 Cruise
3, 4 Build
5 - 7 Descend

Make the first couple of these at a moderate speed - your long-distance pace. For numbers 3 and 4, build by 25's over the course of the 175 going from a cruise to a hard pace by the end of each. Drop back to cruising speed for number 5, but make 6 at a fast medium-distance pace, and make 7 as hard as you can sustain for 175 yards without slowing. There's should be at least 10 seconds difference between your cruise, medium, and fast 175's.

7 x (25 Stroke, 25 all-out sprint)

In our lane, we rotated through the strokes in IM order for this drill. The interval for this should be long, because you're going to be working at an all-out pace. We used a 1:30 interval, whereas our normal 50 yard interval is :45. Do the stroke at a medium-hard pace, hit the turn and come out of it into a hard sprint all the way back. You should be feeling the lactic burn on every one of these.

7 x 125 : 100 Pull, 25 Scull

Use these to improve your feel for the water. Sculling should sensitize your hands to how you're putting pressure on the water. Moderate pace. Resist the urge to go too easy on these.

7 x 25 Cool Down - Just cruise these and let all the lactic acid flush out, stretch your arms out into a long loose stroke. Throw some backstroke in to stretch out the shoulders.

The Almost-Painless Hardcore Distance Set

Here's one for the triathletes and Master's swimmers in our midst:

4 x {
25 hard
50 Distance Pace (DP)
75 hard
100 DP }

5 second rest in between each of the elements, 20 seconds rest in between each repition of the whole set. The key to this set is really making sure that you don't go easy on the DP portions. They should be exactly at your distance pace, not an easy pace. And by 5 seconds rest, I don't mean "round up to the nearest 10 or 15" like so many swimmers do! It's five seconds, no more, no less. So if you normally swim a 1:30 per 100 distance pace, your set might look like:

25 @ 17 seconds, 5 seconds rest
50 @ 45 seconds, 5 seconds rest
75 @ 1:00, 5 seconds rest
100 @ 1:30, 20 seconds rest

This is a great set for many reasons. I like taking it to the outdoor pool in the summer when it's crowded and I need to also keep an eye on my kids. I'm not swimming for more than a minute and a half at any one time, and I end up at both ends of the pool, so it's handy this way. Also, you can do this set in a pool where you can't see the pace clock, which makes it versatile.

This is also a great 1000 yard set to improve your distance swimming. For one thing it doesn't really feel like a long set, it goes by fast. The hard parts are never too long, and broken up by the distance pace. It can really get you to hone in on your distance pace after a hard effort, so in a race situation when you have to work it a little to get ahead of the pack at a buoy turn and then you need to return to your distance pace, you'll know exactly how to do it.

This set is great to do in a mixed group too, it keeps your distance people happy and it keeps your sprinters happy. Nobody can complain too much, yet it's deceptively hard work.

If you really want to do a hardcore set, add this one before or after:
4 x {
100 hard
75 Distance Pace (DP)
50 hard
25 DP }

Enjoy!

Working From the Core

For years, I've been talking with my swimmers about trying to swim from the core, instead of from the arms and feet. Although we use our core muscles for power in almost every other sport (think of a golfer winding up a swing, or a quarterback twisting that arm way back for the Hail Mary pass), when people swim they often tend to be rather flat in the water, moving only their arms and legs. If they're not flat, they're over-rotating their hips to the sides (often influenced by the Total Immersion method) along with their torso. These styles are the equivalent of giving Barry Bonds a baseball bat and asking him to either hit without moving his hips at all, or asking him to move his hips parallel to his shoulders. In neither case would he be able to muster up enough power to send one out of the park (stand up and try it with an imaginary bat if you don't see what I mean).

So I've believed for a long time that the power in a swimming stroke comes from twisting that core, and while the hips will twist too, to a certain extent, rotating them too far will take some of that power away. The human core is like a gigantic spring of muscles which can store a lot of energy once it is twisted and then unleashed. The bummer is that it's hard to describe this to people and have them just get it and be able to translate it to their swimming stroke.

One of the most exciting drills I learned last weekend was something that I think will really help swimmers feel this concept. We were doing a drill that's something like paddling on a surfboard - arms are flexed at right angles and you're paddling with a very flat and short stroke, with no rotation of the torso at all. One of the things this works on is setting that high elbow catch as well (two birds with one stone here). With the next step, you add rotation of the shoulders, but pretend there's a coffee cup balanced on your hips that you don't want to spill. That lets swimmers feel their torso rotating independently from their hips. Just using these drills the other night with my swimmers, many of them were able to have one of those great "aha" moments where they could feel the muscles they needed to be moving in order to start generating power from their core instead of just from their arms. I love it when that happens.

If you watch videos of great swimmers, like this one of Grant Hackett, you can see the rotation of the upper core, independent from the hips that I'm talking about, and how much power comes from that rotation.

More On That High Elbow Catch

Here's a great video that demonstrates the high elbow catch with Sheila Taormina. Another one show's Ian Thorpe's high elbow. And here's a great swim technique video that touches on several points (including the catch) from Dave Scott.