Breaststroke Demos

Below is a great side view demonstration of proper breaststroke technique and an open turn; which is used in breaststroke.

Common breaststroke infractions/mistakes:

1. Taking your breath at the end of a stroke which involves sweeping the hands down to the hips instead of to the shoulders.

• A breast stroke is a short stroke and should finish at the shoulders like this:

• The solution is to shorten your stroke. It may take some practice but it should fix your problem.

2. Non-simultaneous kick or feet not turned out:

• Some swimmers have one foot doing something other than what the other foot is doing. Both feet in breaststroke must be doing the same thing. Toes should be pointing towards the torso.
  
Because most swimmers learn the freestyle first they are used to pointing their toes and so they try and do the frog kick with pointed toes. Whereas the kick must be done with, what I call a flat foot. That is the swimmers toes need to be pointing towards the torso of their body during the main kick.

3.Touching the wall with one hand at the finish or at the turn.

Correct Turn Sequence: Touch or Open Turn

• ØThe same type of turn is used for both butterfly and breaststroke.

• The Rules say that you must touch the wall with two hands, so a touch and pivot turn is used.

• ØThe main thing to remember is that you don't need to hang on to the wall. The quicker you touch it and pull your hands away the better.

The material in this presentation; including pictures, animations, and descriptions, was altered from the original format. It was obtained on 12/7/2010 at 1:46 p.m from http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/sport2/hi/other_sports/swimming/4225756.stm

Published: 2005/10/10 11:43:45 GMT

© BBC MMX

USA swimming Short Course Nationals - Live

Tune into NBC's coverage of the Short Course Championships, Saturday and Sunday at 2:00 PM. Many of the top swimmers both young and old will are competing. Check it out!

Follow the Swimming National Champs

The Short Course Nationals are going on. Check out what
the top swimmers are doing. How do you compare?


http://www.star-meets.org/results/SCNats/2010/

Thanksgiving B-day attact

Before and After

Happy Birthday Chase!

After!

The Turkey Shoot Out - Wednesday AM

Breathing patterns

Bilateral Breathing: Breathe every 3, 5, 7 for Speed, and Efficiency

If you're not breathing to both sides, it's never too late to start. It helps balance your stroke, creates symmetry in back musculature, helps eliminate cramping and increases your oxygen intake, resulting in a more efficient, faster stroke. Plus in a race, breathing bilaterally helps you keep an eye on your competition.

The key to doing this correctly is proper rotation. If you're whipping your head around to breathe on your weaker side, your hips will drop and throw your balance. Here's how to make bilateral breathing easier:

         Practice rotation drills. A great one to start with your body on its side, with the bottom arm extending out in front and the top arm resting on your side. Point your nose to the bottom of the pool. Slowly kick to keep your hips up. Roll and stroke until you are lying on the opposite side. Breathe freely and check your balance. Then turn your head so your nose points to the bottom, and stay on your side for 10 kicks. Repeat the motion for the length of the pool.

         Try a set where you breathe to your right side on one length and to your left on the next.

         On sets of 75s, breathe every five strokes on the first 25, every three strokes on the second length and every stroke (right-left-right-left) on the last length.

         Breathe to your weak side in all warm ups, cool downs and slower swimming sets, and to your strong side on main sets. Gradually make the shift to bilateral breathing on main sets.

         It doesn't matter if you practice bilateral breathing per lap or per set. What matters is staying balanced and symmetrical so you can breathe easily on both sides. Once you begin regular bilateral breathing, it gets easier with every practice.

         Stay smooth and fluid while breathing every third stroke. Eventually with practice, breathing every cycle with no interruption in your flow should be easy. Your goal should be to breathe evenly to both sides in all your practices and races.

 

Looking for a Christmas gift??

I like the idea of having a go-to water bottle. I've tried several, all of which had their strengths and weaknesses. But all of them, with time, ended up getting a little funky at the bottom. Enter, the Clean Bottle

The 22-ounce bottles are available in retailers and on Clean Bottle's website for $9.95, with 10% of proceeds going to eco-friendly charities. For a problem I've encountered for years and years, it's the best kind of solution: an incredibly simple one.

Top 10 reasons to be a distance swimmer

Top 10 Reasons to be a Distance Swimmer!

10. More swim for my money

9. During my race I have more time to sing to my self

8. Distance swimmers can count higher

7. Lap counters kneel down for me

6. Plenty of time to go to the bathroom before my heat

5. I can name all the swimmers who compete in my event

4. People cheer for me longer

3. I can still win after a cannonball start

2. I’ll have the best chance of survival if my ship sinks

And the #1 reason to be a distance swimmer...

1. I’ve got GUTS!

7 Quick swim fin tips to make your life smarter, better, faster and wiser!

(1) Muscle Builder
They're not only for your legs. Swim fins help condition your legs as much as they do your arms. Think about it. You swim faster with swim fins, so your arms need to move faster to keep up. Your arms don't have to pull as hard to move your weight through the water, your legs are doing that with the help of the fins. Your arms need to slice through the water, learning better technique.

(2) Charlie Horse
Ever had that tight, ball-like cramping in a muscle known as a Charlie Horse? The more you use swim fins, the more likely you are to get an occasional Charlie Horse. Want to avoid it? Stretch your calves a lot. Stretch calves before and after you swim. Stretch them while standing in line at a store. Stretch them all the time! Also try eating bananas. Bananas have potassium in them and potassium helps keep your muscles from cramping.

(3) Kick With and Kick Without
With or without? Practice breaststroke kicks without swim fins, yet both with and without a kick board. Practice the flutter kick and dolphin kick both with and without swim fins, and with and without a kick board. Practice each of these kicks on your stomach and on your back. Practice kicking on your back with your arms in a tight streamline position and no kick board. For beginning swimmers learning the backstroke, try holding a kick board across your stomach as you lie on your back and practice flutter kick.

(4) Now you have to keep your knees together.
I hold those things how?! In between your thighs, just above your knees. Pull-buoys. They adjust to fit between your legs, one buoy in front, the straps in the middle, and one buoy in the back. Use pull-buoys to help your legs float while you don't kick and pull yourself through the water. It's a strength workout for your arms. It's worth it, try it. Your stroke will get better, more efficient, and stronger. It's like using swim fins, only opposite.

(5) Isn't That Backwards?
Why kick on your back when you swim on your front? Swimmers can often get into bad habits. Some of those habits can be fixed by practicing the correct body movements in a different way. For instance, breaststrokers may get in the habit of dropping their knees toward the bottom of the pool when trying to swim faster. To help your muscles remember not to do that, practice breaststroke kicks on your back where you cannot drop your knees. Then, flip over and see how it feels. Flutter kicking on your back in a streamline position helps keep your body in an elongated position, the best position to be in while swimming, and a position that swimmers may forget to emphasize when tired. You have to stay long while on your back in order to float.

(6) Equipment Essentials
There are three pieces of equipment that are a must for swimmers in training, and swimmers who are learning. The first is swim fins. The second is a pull-buoy, and the third is a kick board. Most pools have both pull-buoys and kick boards for you to use, however, you may not like the type of pull-buoy they have available, so this is something you may like to purchase on your own. They are not expensive and will fit in your bag. Buy the adjustable kind so you can make them fit your body.

(7) Both Tall and Small Win the Race
Short or long swimming fins? The answer is both. You don't need to buy both, but you should try both, and you can purchase and use either one. You will move your legs faster when flutter kicking with short fins, but long fins will give you a greater push when dolphin kicking, making it easier to work on your butterfly arms. Regardless of which type suits you best, fins are a must.

Swimming and the Common Cold

Exercise and fitness can fend off the occurrences of the common cold. People that exercised 5 days per week had 46% less sick days over a 12 week period.

Pyamid of Success

Direction

Developing Direction

The final piece in the motivational puzzle is direction. If focus means having an ultimate goal, direction is having a day-to-day strategy to achieve it. A lack of direction kills motivation because without an obvious next action we succumb to procrastination. An example of this is a person who wants to have a popular blog, but who spends more time reading posts about blogging than actually writing articles.

The key to finding direction is identifying the activities that lead to success. For every goal, there are activities that pay off and those that don’t. Make a list of all your activities and arrange them based on results. Then make a make an action plan that focuses on the activities that lead to big returns. To continue the example from above, a blogger’s list would look something like this:

1. Write content
2. Research relevant topics
3. Network with other bloggers
4. Optimize design and ad placements
5. Answer comments and email
6. Read other blogs

Keeping track of your most important tasks will direct your energy towards success. Without a constant reminder, it’s easy to waste entire days on filler activities like reading RSS feeds, email, and random web surfing.

When my motivation starts to wane, I regain direction by creating a plan that contains two positive actions. The first one should be a small task you’ve been meaning to do, while the second should be a long-term goal. I immediately do the smaller task. This creates positive momentum. After that I take the first step towards achieving the long-term goal. Doing this periodically is great for getting out of a slump, creating positive reinforcement, and getting long-term plans moving.

It’s inevitable that you’ll encounter periods of low energy, bad luck, and even the occasional failure. If you don’t discipline your mind, these minor speed bumps can turn into mental monsters. By being on guard against the top 3 motivation killers you can preserve your motivation and propel yourself to success.

Tortuous and the Hare

We all know the story of the tortuous and the hare, turtle vs. rabbit, and of course the turtle wins! Did the turtle win because it was a Terrapin? Possibly, but there is more to this story if we look a bit closer.

Take a minute and think, if you were in the story would you be the tortuous or the hare?
~ Hare (rabbit) – small, hairy, sleek, short bursts of speed
~ Tortuous (turtle) - small, round hard shell, reliable consistent speed

Reading this tale and applying it to swimming today we can get a unique perspective. At swim meets some athletes see themselves as the turtle, not as fast or as powerful. Then we have others who know they are the rabbit, blazing fast and able to win every time. Is this the same at practices?

Which of the two, rabbit or turtle, do you think a coach would rather have on their team? As a coach we love having those swimmers who can set and break records, who wouldn’t? When showing up to practice and stepping into the pool we can see a huge difference between the tortuous and the hare. Every day the tortuous is there 10 minutes before practice, stretching and preparing for the workout ahead, meanwhile the hare runs in tying his suit just as the warm-up is ending. The turtle, who may not be as fast as the hare (yet) works as hard as they can on every set, and does every yard in the set. The hare jumps in sprints a few laps then stops to take a water break, or go to the bathroom. The hare does just enough to keep the coach from yelling at them then get out and goes home.

When it comes time for the “big” swim meet who is now better prepared to swim?

Working with kids at various levels of swimming it can be difficult let those who see themselves as the tortuous that being seen as the hare is not always best. The tortuous with their hard work and dedication WILL one day be FASTER than the hare!

Again, which are you. . .the tortuous or the hare?

Focus

Developing Tangible Focus

The second motivation killer is a lack of focus. How often do you focus on what you don’t want, rather than on a concrete goal? We normally think in terms of fear. I’m afraid of being poor. I’m afraid no one will respect me. I’m afraid of being alone. The problem with this type of thinking is that fear alone isn’t actionable. Instead of doing something about our fear, it feeds on itself and drains our motivation.

If you’re caught up in fear based thinking, the first step is focusing that energy on a well defined goal. By defining a goal, you automatically define a set of actions. If you have a fear of poverty, create a plan to increase your income. It could be going back to school, obtaining a higher paying job, or developing a profitable website. The key is moving from an intangible desire to concrete, measurable steps.

By focusing your mind on a positive goal instead of an ambiguous fear, you put your brain to work. It instantly begins devising a plan for success. Instead of worrying about the future you start to do something about it. This is the first step in motivating yourself to take action. When know what you want, you become motivated to take action.

Confidence

How to Boost Confidence

The first motivation killer is a lack of confidence. When this happens to me, it’s usually because I’m focusing entirely on what I want and neglecting what I already have. When you only think about what you want, your mind creates explanations for why you aren’t getting it. This creates negative thoughts. Past failures, bad breaks, and personal weaknesses dominate your mind. You become jealous of your competitors and start making excuses for why you can’t succeed. In this state, you tend to make a bad impression, assume the worst about others, and lose self confidence.

The way to get out of this thought pattern is to focus on gratitude. Set aside time to focus on everything positive in your life. Make a mental list of your strengths, past successes, and current advantages. We tend to take our strengths for granted and dwell on our failures. By making an effort to feel grateful, you’ll realize how competent and successful you already are. This will rejuvenate your confidence and get you motivated to build on your current success.

It might sound strange that repeating things you already know can improve your mindset, but it’s amazingly effective. The mind distorts reality to confirm what it wants to believe. The more negatively you think, the more examples your mind will discover to confirm that belief. When you truly believe that you deserve success, your mind will generate ways to achieve it. The best way to bring success to yourself is to genuinely desire to create value for the rest of the world.

Motivation

Staying motivated is a struggle — our drive is constantly assaulted by negative thoughts and anxiety about the future. Everyone faces doubt and depression. What separates the highly successful is the ability to keep moving forward.
There is no simple solution for a lack of motivation. Even after beating it, the problem reappears at the first sign of failure. The key is understanding your thoughts and how they drive your emotions. By learning how to nurture motivating thoughts, neutralize negative ones, and focus on the task at hand, you can pull yourself out of a slump before it gains momentum.

Reasons We Lose Motivation
There are 3 primary reasons we lose motivation.
Lack of confidence – If you don’t believe you can succeed, what’s the point in trying?
Lack of focus – If you don’t know what you want, do you really want anything?
Lack of direction – If you don’t know what to do, how can you be motivated to do it?

Over the next few days we will go into those three points further.

Papers, Pencils, Books - Hey Man You're All Set!

Cool guy wearing jeans and a Rolling Stone T shirt approaches a nerdy freshman with black framed glassed, pants pulled up passed his belly button carrying a stack a books, 3 pencils and a note pad in his shirt pocket. He pokes him in the chest and says: "got your papers, pencils, and books - hey man you're all set!" Cool guy skips class, and nerdy guy goes to all classes and getting straight 'A's.

What's important about this is that 90 percent of success occurs before class, or in a swimmers case before they take a stroke. You need to have the correct suit, goggles, equipment, and mindset before you hop into the pool. You need to be prepared with your goals for the day, month and year.

You know how this story ends. Nerdy guy grows up graduates tops in his class at Harvard, and now owns a Software company. And cool guy, wears the same jeans and T shirt but he also got a job - WORKING FOR NERDY GUY AS A JANITOR.

Be prepared!

Welcome to the New TTST Season

Swimmers are off to a fresh start - ready a raring to swim! We're looking to have fun, and swim fast.

The best way to get started is to start setting a few goals for yourself.
What do you want to achieve this year?
When do you want to achieve it?
What will help you along the way?

EX
Set a time goal. 1:00 100 free
Set a date when you wish to achieve it. Gulf Champs December
Identify the steps that will help you in the quest. Improve turns, head position.

You are surrounded by supportive teammates, coaches and parents. Let them help you get to the next level!

Good luck and welcome back

NCAA Championships Women

What is your best event? Get an idea of what real fast swimming is all about, and what you can look forward to, if you are consistant, with attendance, attitude, and effort. Copy the link.
http://www.swimmingworldmagazine.com/results/results_browse.asp?iCatId=4&StrCatName=College+Meet+Results

Swimming a Bobsled run!

The difference between gold, silver, and bronze, or standing on the podium or watching from the sidelines in the Winter Olympic bobsled competition was decided by inches, and hundreds of a seconds. Does that sound familiar to swimmers out there?

They super imposed the winning run over second place and the differences were inches on the height on the wall during a turn. Mistakes at the top were difficult to make up at the bottom of the run.

What can you learn from the bobsledders?
- The sled with the best start time stands a good chance of winning
- Athletes had to be perfectly streamlined during the entire run
- Entering and exiting a turn had to be precise
- Straights had to be clean, and in a straight line
- Starts, turns, streamline, straights added up to a fast finish

Proper execution, or little mistakes in these areas decide the medalists or bystanders.

This is exactly what world record holder swimmers concentrate and work so hard on.

- Starts must be powerful
- Streamlined starts and strokes are a must
- Turns are nearly 30% of the race
- Swimming in a straight line insures that you swim 25 yards not 26!
- They all add up to your best time

Any problems in any one area hurt your chances of victory.

Pretend you're a winning bobsledder - it could help your chances for success.

Swimming and the Winter Olympics

Think outside the box. Follow the athletes and events of the Winter Olympics. Find out how they deal with:

• Success
• Failure
• Adverse conditions
• Goal setting
  

What was their training routine like?
Do they have desire, dedication, and a high commitment level?

Read the sports blogs, and pages.
You'll see that although the sports are very different the effort needed to be at a high level is much the same in all sports.

The Olympics Start Today!

Keys to success with 2008 Olympian Scott Spann

Below is are the keys to success for Scott Span, who made the 2008 Olympic Team with an upset victory over Brendan Hansen in the 200 Breaststroke.

"Motivation. This has been my personal key to success the past two years. I have found a variety of ways to motivate myself, and I have made sure to accentuate these. I have favorite songs, movies, posters, quotes, clothes, articles and records that all get my heart pumping fast and make me want to compete at a higher level. Most importantly, I have very specific goals, worded in a very specific way so that when I recite them, I get so excited inside that I cannot help but want to keep going or work harder. Motivation is the key to working hard because it is just as important to be in the game mentally as it is physically."

"Determination. Determination and motivation go hand in hand with how they operate, but determination is the action of the two. Motivation makes an athlete mentally strive for improvement, but determination is the physical part that makes the athlete actually do it. I believe that determination is a part of human nature that is almost like a muscle. Determination is not something gained overnight. It has to be worked on. Exercising determination is very hard because it tests you both mentally and physically. The best way to work on improving this “muscle” is to make yourself go that extra stroke, extra lap or extra mile when everyone – including you – does not believe it is possible. When an athlete can master this key to success, there is absolutely nothing that can stop him from succeeding."

"Focus. This is a key that ties in with maturity. At a young age, competition was more about friends, food and games between events. All of that is important growing up, but as maturity settles in, focus becomes the X-factor for an athlete. Focus determines how prepared an athlete is when he enters a race. When I am in my most focused states at competitions, I am in my own world, my "zone" as some would call it. When I am in this zone, everything I do is to better my performance in the race. I take the shortest route to the blocks, I keep my body at a very stable temperature, I make sure I am taking in the right amount of nutrients before I compete. This is a key to success that many athletes have trouble handling, and they lose focus when it counts most. Losing focus makes it hard for athletes to believe in themselves and can also lead to changing race strategy and returning to previous bad habits."

"Discipline. Discipline is the backbone of any successful athlete. It puts all of the keys together. The advantage of having good discipline is the mental toughness that helps give an athlete a competitive edge. Discipline is also our way of taking control of a stressful situation instead of letting our feelings of pain or resentment take over. Building this skill helps in every aspect in – and especially out – of the pool. This is when we are taught quitting is not the answer."

"Confidence. Even when I was much younger, I was not afraid to show people that I had a lot of self-confidence when it came to athletics. I was always the first to accept or create a challenge and never, ever settled for second place. I would always call out a double-or-nothing scenario. Confidence does not mean that you belittle opponents in any way. In fact, the athletes who have the most self-confidence are the ones who can show it with class. Win or lose, I will always congratulate my opponents, but I always keep my chin up and prepare for the next opportunity. It is so important to control emotions because confidence can be a tricky success key to master. It often leads to being overconfident and underestimating the competition."

Winning and losing –

Winning and losing –

Ever notice the difference in the reaction of a winner of a race, and the 2nd place person? Winners seem to have the extra energy to fist pump, point fingers to the stands, have ear to ear smiles, congratulate their opponents, and even give interviews!

Second place people hang their heads, pout, slouch over the lane-line as if they swam twice as far. They have long sad faces, as if they ate an onion, and never get interviewed!

Both put tremendous effort and skills into the same race. Which one do you want to be?

To enjoy swimming at a high level is to conquer the many details of practicing and racing every chance you get. It all begins with a positive outlook on what you want and how you are going to get there. Key words like – I want, I like, I can, I will must possess you brain on a consistent basis in order to begin you positive journey to swimming excellence.

Champions train, compete, and expect hard efforts everyday. Easy is out of the equation. They may take a simple detail of a race - for instance a dolphin kick on a dive, and repeat it everyday until the desired result is achieve. They know that improving this technique might make them 1-2 one hundreds faster and allow them to win a race. Champions love improving details, and enjoy working hard to get there.

Picture 2 swimmers at practice of equal ability. Both have a set of 10 x 25 fly on 40 seconds.

Swimmer 1 says “I love improving fly; I want to get better at dolphin kicking, I can beat everyone here, I will race each 25!” Love – want – can – will.

Swimmer 2 says “I hate fly; underwater kicking is hard; I can’t hold my breath, I won’t make it, it’s too tiring!” Hate – hard – cant- won’t.

Which swimmer will benefit the most from this set? As you can see, winning and losing habits are beginning to form. Attitude is everything! What you say is what you get!

How do you approach practices, practice sets, your worst stroke, meet races?
Will you be pouting and hanging on the lane-line?
Will you be jubilant and giving interviews?

Winning and losing is UP TO YOU!!

New Year Resolution!

Happy New Year! This is the season for those New Year Resolutions. One problem with resolutions is that they usually don’t become reality. It’s not that your resolution isn’t worthwhile, but like most other resolutions, most people don‘t follow up on them, which is the most important part of the process.

Heath clubs make a killing during this time as lots of people vow to get in shape during the New Year, spend lots of money in memberships, and then stop showing up. It can be exciting for the first few visits, but getting in shape boils down to establishing a new routine and putting in a lot of hard work. It is easy to find reasons not to follow up and have your body ache every day. Old routines are easy and don’t hurt as much!

Like the health club situation, improving your swimming skills require a new routine and hard work. It is much easier to do things only when your coach asks you to do it. The most difficult par is to do I when they coach isn’t watching or asking you to work on it.

It takes only 2-4 weeks to create a new routine. Can you imagine the rewards if you acquired all the skills your coach showed you? How many seconds could you save?
Michael Phelps would stand a chance!

Simple steps to acquiring a new skill
1 – Picture what you would look like
2 – Write it down
3 – Take action – do it every opportunity
4 – Evaluate you progress
5 – Enjoy the new you