Advice on swim type?

[thigger]

Hi,

I'm wondering if anyone can advise me on my swim type so I can get the correct card of exercises. Also, if anyone has any other advice I'd be grateful!

I'm a relative novice - started swimming for triathlon about 2yrs ago. I've always been fairly comfortable in and around water though (sailing background).

I'm 6'4" and weigh 200lbs, though I'm not fat - I can quite easily sit on the bottom of the pool even with a fair bit of air in my lungs. My legs are long for my height (37" inside leg) and my arms are quite long (3" 'ape index').

I swim at a stroke rate of about 60 I think most of the time (probably 55-65). Relaxed swimming is about 2:00/100m, CSS about 1:40, max sprint about 1:15 (though I can't keep this up for more than 50m).

I'm terrible at kicking (the girls I normally swim with go streaming past during kick sets, despite being about the same speed or slightly slower at other times); a pull buoy makes no difference to my speed. I've been accused of 'windmilling' and it's been suggested I should do catch-up sets to increase my glide (though I'm not sure if I should do this when the Swim Smooth book and website suggest it can be a bad thing).

I seem to be fairly 'mono-paced' - I swim roughly the same pace (1:40 or nearby) in a 400m pool sprint triathlon as in a 3800m ironman (though the IM is in open water and a wetsuit which helps). Swimming even a few seconds faster than 1:40 feels really hard and makes me quite out of breath.

Any thoughts? I seem to match a bit of 'Arnie' and 'Swinger' though the automated form on the website adds in the possibility of 'Overglider' and even 'Kicktastic' which seems bizarre!

Thanks for your help!

[SolarEnergy]

Of course I got thoughts...

http://www.arhy.org/swim-predict

Fill in the original calculation sheet.

If your SDI is flatter than 1.06, then you may simply lack pure speed.

Working on catchup, as far as I am concerned, it not a sin at all. There are ways smarter than others that said.

Using a tempo trainer, time trial at low rate. If 60 is your sweet spot, go slightly below 50. And swim as fast as you can for 600m with a pull buoy. Monitor improvement from time to time.

I'd expect that you could go down close to 10min flat, given your best effort over 100m. If you fail at making it within 11:30, then yeah you could benefit from this sort of work a bit.

Not saying making an obsession, but once in a whilst.

What this site and most other serious sites would warn you against, is developing a stroke that is such that you can not do otherwise. If you can't swim in any other way than overgliding, then you're an overglider.

Several top level sprinters like to overglide at training during some long aerobic sets.

They look as follow: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmRVoVKx3Hk

This is an extreme case, but it's not at all unusual. When's time to perform threshold stuff though, that guy will stop overgliding and start swimming. That's how I see it.

[thigger]

Thanks for the advice.
I come out as 1.05 on that sheet, using a couple of pool swim time-trials (I'm sure it'd be much lower if I used an open-water swim for the longer distance!)

Is the time-trialling at 50spm with a pull buoy aiming at making an emphasis on taking longer over the catch?

[Adam Young]

Hi thigger,

Yes, sometimes that happens with the Swim Type questionnaire, if it's not sure it'll spit out a bit of a mix of types.

Based on what you said, I think you're probably a developed Arnie (possibly towards an Overglider or Swinger). The thing to do with cross-breeds is to follow the process for the first time (in your case Arnie) and refine the rougher elements that will still be in place in your stroke. Then contact me (adam@swimsmooth.com) to let me know how you got on and we'll send you a complimentary copy of the best follow-on guide for you depending where you're at.

Keep up the good work with your swimming and I hope that helps!

Adam

[thigger]

Thanks! I'd suspected I was an Arnie, though I think my legs are a lot higher since I realised that I had to pull back rather than just throwing my arms in big circles Hopefully I'm developing into a Swinger (that's the plan at least) - I'm pretty sure I don't have much 'glide' in my stroke at the moment.
I've bought the Arnie guide and will be trying out one of the sessions tomorrow - shiny new paddles and fins in tow! (all the gear...)

[thigger]

Really impressed with the swim guide - I was worried it'd be very similar to the book; but it's really nice to have everything laid out and referenced to my swimming style.
I tried sessions 1&2 today - enjoyable, and I was surprised that by the end I'd completed 3500m with minimum boredom (normally I'm wanting to leave by about half that!).
One worry - trying to swim at 50spm was quite difficult without either moving my arms quite slowly or having a 'pause' at the front. Is the pause the aim? I played around with the Tempo trainer afterwards and I think my normal stroke rate is actually about 65 - at least that's the rate that felt most comfortable.
Thanks for the help!

[SolarEnergy]

Oh man, what a testimony. And this is what guides are, a 360 approach so that you just don't have to worry about anything other than crawling through it from start to finish.

Catch Master Class DVD is excellent too obviously, as it helps you better understanding some of the drills explained in the Guide.

Glad you did 3.5, that's excellent!