Developing your rhythm and timing helps you with your cross-connection through the body (see last week’s video for more on this). One aspect of this is your catch and down kick… Most top-level swimmers coordinate their catch and down kick on the same side of their body as you’ll see in this video featuring Mack Horton, Sharon van Rouwendaal and Katie Ledecky.

Transcription:

You’ll see the same thing with Mack Horton here. So he’s using a two bit kick here, much longer stroke, but again you can see that timing of the downwards kick, and the catch.

Hi, Brenton here from Effortless Swimming. Short video today, I’m out on the road looking at a new camp location here in Australia. But I wanted to put together this video, which is about the timing of your catch and your kick.

The last principle that we teach in our five core principles is to find your rhythm and timing. And if you can put that together, it’s kind of like the final piece of the puzzle. Now, part of that timing is what you’ll see with most top swimmers, are they move through their catch at the same time that they have a downwards kick on that same side of the body.

So if you think of coordinating your catch and your kick on that same side of the body, together, that’s going to be part of developing your rhythm. So let’s have a look at a couple of swimmers here. We’ve got Sharon. She’s got a crossover kick, but even still, she’s got that downwards kick that happens at the same time as her catch.

You’ll see the same thing with Mack Horton here. So he’s using a two-bit kick here, much longer stroke, but again you can see that timing of the downwards kick, and the catch. And finally we’ve got [inaudible 00:01:19] here, using a four-bit kick, but with again that same timing.

So if you haven’t got that correct timing yet, then a way to do it is to do a few focus laps. So let’s say it’s eight fifty is a normal freestyle. And all you’re trying to do is kick down at the same time you move through your catch. And over those eight fifties, you’ll probably start to find a better rhythm and balance through your body. And you’ll start to get into this nice rhythm and flow with the stroke.

It can take a little bit of experimenting to get it, but that is a really good way to make sure that you’re getting this cross-connection through the body that we spoke about in last week’s video. And it’s one piece of the puzzle to putting a stroke together.

So I hope you enjoyed this video. If you know someone who would enjoy it, make sure you like, and subscribe, and share it with that person. I’ll be back next week with another video.