Top Stories From 2007 Publication Cycle of Swimming World

PHOENIX, Arizona, December 23. AFTER taking a look at Choosing Your Event by Wayne Goldsmith from the February 2007 issue of Swimming World, we check out Shoulder Shift Can Lead to a Faster Freestyle by Karlyn-Pipes Neilsen from the May 2007 issue.

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SHOULDER SHIFT CAN LEAD TO A FASTER FREESTYLE, BY KARLYN PIPES-NEILSEN
Here are six tips to help improve your freestyle. Slow down, practice one thing at a time and keep it simple. Seek progress not perfection and always remember to have fun!

I discovered a new way to swim freestyle several years ago after reading an article in Swimming World Magazine by Ron Johnson, former coach at Arizona State and a SWIM Magazine World Masters Swimmer of the Year.

In the January 2000 article, in Good Sequence Illustrating the New Australian Crawl, Johnson wrote, the shoulder shift is the single most obvious difference between the great contemporary Australian freestylers and today’s top American male swimmers. He also found that there is considerable overlap in the stroke (catchup … the upper arm and shoulder are in a higher and more stable position…and the stroke is wider throughout and more along the shoulder line. This pull is also wider than generally advocated…. The stroke that was being endorsed at the time was one with a great deal of shoulder rotation and swimming on your side. Johnson’s analysis made sense
to me:

I thought that by using a shoulder shift instead of a roll, a few extra inches would be available on every pull. By reaching or extending forward, natural core/hip rotation would occur. With a slightly wider-than-shoulder-width hand placement and an early/high elbow catch, I would have a stronger and more efficient pull. I tried it, and it translated into lifetime bests in both freestyle and butterfly at the age of 42.

Here are six tips to help improve your freestyle:

MINIMIZE SHOULDER ROTATION
Too much shoulder rotation burns up energy and does little to help you move forward. Instead, shift the shoulder forward, allowing the body to rotate as one unit, using the core and the hips to generate power.

TRY A WIDER HAND PLACEMENT
With less shoulder roll, you can have a slightly wider-than-shoulder-width hand placement. This wider spacing creates the foundation for a powerful and more stable pull. The next time you get out of the pool, look at your hands. You probably placed them about shoulder-width apart. That’s because you knew that you needed power, leverage and stability to exit the pool. Apply this same principle to where your power is in the pull.

EXTEND AND PAUSE
Here’s another term for the catchup stroke. The extend and pause allows the pull to catch up to the often shorter recovery phase, and gives you time to set up the catch. If you swim with a mirror stroke, you may be rushing your pull.

PRACTICE A HIGH ELBOW/EARLY CATCH
After extend and pause, initiate the catch by lifting the elbow and pointing the fingertips downward. The wrist is firm and straight, but the hand is relaxed. A great visualization technique for a high elbow catch is to imagine you are swimming over a very shallow coral reef. You can’t touch the coral, so the arm must bend at the elbow to accommodate the shallower pull. (However, do not internally rotate the shoulder, as this may cause injury.)

PULL ALONGSIDE THE BODY
You would never put a paddle in front or under a canoe or kayak. Apply the same principle to swimming. An efficient pull catches or holds the water to move you forward, with the hand entering and exiting the water at about the same location. The old pull pattern moved water you want the water to move you!

APPLY POWER
After the catch, apply power early and round off the pull at the hips. With this wider stroke, the power is in the front, using large muscle groups instead of the back, which relies on the triceps.

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