Triathlon Swimming Foundations: A Straightforward System for Making Beginner Triathletes Comfortable and Confident in the Water (Triathlon Foundations Book 1) by Taren Gesell

Author:Taren Gesell [Gesell, Taren]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: UNKNOWN
Published: 2019-08-14T00:00:00+00:00

RACE LIKE AN ARROW TECHNIQUE

Correct swim technique to race like an arrow is very simple. Combined with the skills you developed in the first two sections, this will be easy to master because this technique actually minimizes movements. When you’re racing like an arrow, you’ll look like this:

1. Your head, hips, and feet will stay in a straight line the entire time.

2. Your hand will enter the water between the edge of your head and the outside of your shoulder.

3. While under the water, your hand will travel in a path that stays in the same channel it entered the water (between the edge of your head and the outside of your shoulder).

4. While under the water, the palm of your hand will always face the back wall of the pool.

Those four points are the simple steps we’ll work on to tie everything together so you’re moving all your energy in a straight line. Forget about the articles you’ve read describing “the seven phases of the swim stroke,” or worrying about the details of “enter-extend-pull-exit-recover.” And don’t even get me started on the underwater S-pull. That’s all too complicated! All you need to do is put your arm into the water straight above your shoulder and pull it straight back.

When we start to approach the Race Like an Arrow technique, we’re working to accomplish a few things:

1. We have to keep our hips and feet in a straight line.

2. We have to keep our hands and arms generating force in a straight line.

3. We have to make the movement simple enough that it can be performed under pressure, during a race.

4. We have to make the technique accessible to us stiff adult triathletes who don’t have the flexibility of elite swimmers who seem to be made of Silly Putty.

Common faults that lead to swaying side to side (most of which will have been addressed in the “Float Like a Log” section):

1. Lifting the head up to breathe which drives the legs down.

2. A loose core that isn’t stiff enough to resist side to side movement.

3. A floppy scissor kick with wide legs that pulls the body side to side.

4. A hand that enters the water, pulls underwater, or exits the water outside of the channel between the edge of the head and the outside of the shoulder.

5. A hand that faces inward or outward, thus pushing water to one side or the other and not directly in behind the athlete.

For those familiar with articles that discuss such fine minutia as “the nine phases of the triathlon swim stroke,” our guidelines may sound oversimplified. The reason that the “Race Like an Arrow” technique sounds simple is that it should be simple for age-group triathletes! Elite swimmers’ races are decided in hundredths of a second, so they require perfection in every aspect of the stroke and can thus obsess about every single inch of the stroke in great detail. Triathletes don’t have such requirements. We need a technique that’s easy to replicate over and over while under the stress, and throughout the entire distance, of a race-day swim.

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