In today’s video we’re looking at an athlete who is swimming quite well and when we did a session, there are a couple of things that we wanted to work on and change to help him get more out of his stroke.

1. Entry.
He is entering a little bit too far out in front of his head which is causing him to keep his hand a bit too high for a bit too long in the extension phase of the stroke. If you don’t set up the stroke from on top and with your entry then the catch and pool are going to be impacted. What we worked on is entering a little bit earlier. Getting the fingers in first, making sure the elbows slightly elevated while the fingertips are entering and then getting the last bit of extension and reach happening in the water.

2. Rotation
When we look from the front or from the top, often we like to look at the alignment of the stroke, where you are entering and extending forward. You will notice that there’s just not enough rotation through the torso or through the shoulders. One thing that we have worked on is a little bit more rotation through the shoulders and the body to be able to find a better rhythm in the stroke.

3. Head position.
We worked on getting that down a little bit more. He is a triathlete so he has the tendency to look a little bit forward than your typical pool swimmer. We wanted him to look a bit further down and get the head slightly deeper.

4. Hand Wider than the Elbow
When it does that, you are not necessarily pointing yourself forwards, you’re more pointing yourself off to the side. When the hand is wider than the elbow as it’s about to pull through past the shoulder, you’re not able to engage your lats very well. When we are swimming freestyle, we want to have the shoulder blade or the scapula retracted. We want to be engaging the lats and it’s very hard to do that when the hand is wider than the elbow as you’re pulling through past your shoulder