Now if only I could swim "right"

[cjsmith]

I have developed a weird style that has arms from, oh, the breaststroke or the butterfly or something, and a scissor-kick from the sidestroke. My head bobs on every stroke; at the high point I breathe, and even at the low point my eyes are usually still out of the water. (That last is very handy for me. I veer if I'm not looking.) I'm bothered by the asymmetry of the scissor-kick, but not enough that I spend time doing it the opposite way.

I have almost completely forgotten how to do the basic crawl. I can flutter-kick, and I am comfortable doing that when I am on a kickboard, but the flutter-kick doesn't go well with what my arms want to do. The arm and head motion of the crawl feels very wrong to me, and besides, it puts water in my ears. I am convinced this is the main purpose of the crawl. :-)

Comments

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

I have developed a weird style

At least you can swim. I can dead-man float, but that's not particularly useful for very long. When I try a basic crawl, I seem to kick forever to make little forward progress. :-)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I was a much better swimmer, at least in terms of technical skill, when I was a kid. I knew lots of different strokes; I could tread water, dead-man float, swim underwater, and all sorts of stuff. Now I just do my weirdo style. Anything else is awkward and annoying.

[dizzdvl.livejournal.com]

I totally do that! And yes I just said totally! My sister tried to teach me the correct kick for breaststroke and it is hard. It's completely different now than when we were kids. But you know the scissor-kick breast stroke thing works. And my legs are not how I swim. I power it out with my arms, which is why I got the flippers.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Oddly enough, I seem to swim just as fast doing a flutter-kick while holding on to a kickboard as I do in my weird-ass style without a kickboard at all. Yet in that weird-ass style, my arms get tired. Clearly a flutter-kick generates more power than my scissor-kick!

[johno.livejournal.com]

Flashing back to my swim team days.

It's not the crawl that is meant to drown you, it's the butterfly. ;)

As you state you are doing the crawl incorrectly.

1) Don't inhale on every stroke. You inhale every 3rd or 4th stroke

2) Alway exhale through your nosw when under water. This keeps your nostrols clear and creates enough pressure to lessen the water getting in your ears.

3) Don't worry about your leg stroke. What ever works for you. The "proper" kick matters if you want effiecny or speed.

4) Despite the above water appearance, the crawl is a very sleek stroke with a tight underwater form as your arm come back into the water and push the water down your body and rocking motion as your arms rise out of the water and on you take your breath.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I thought I was fairly clear in stating that I was not doing the crawl at all.

[mama-hogswatch.livejournal.com]

http://www.totalimmersion.net/

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Nifty! If they have a way to keep water out of my ears when I turn my head to take a breath in the crawl, I'm so there. (And if they don't, it won't help me a whit because I won't do it. *sigh*)

[mama-hogswatch.livejournal.com]

Earplugs. Or wax.

I used to use them when I was a kid and had chronic ear infections.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I should give earplugs a try. I have a couple pair hanging around the house. Thanks!

[cassidyrose.livejournal.com]

You might find it helpful to take swim lessons geared specifically towards stroke technique for adults. If you developed good technique in more than one stroke you might find swimming more fun and you might make more/better progress. Dunno. Just a sleep-deprived thought.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's a good thought. Of course swimming is already getting more time than I want it to take (what with the two showers and the driving and the changing clothes twice and all). I wonder at what point it's worth committing more time to this in order to, in future, dislike it less. Hmm... probably the earlier I do it the better off I'll be. If my feet won't heal, swimming is my best option for the rest of my life, and that's an awful lot of time to be doing something awkwardly and disliking it!

Awkward

[mama-hogswatch.livejournal.com]

Swimming when you feel awkward is no fun, that's the truth!

Honestly, swimming isn't much of a workout until you get your technique straightened out, as you've already indicated. It's one of the reasons that swimming is often discouraged as a cardio for the very overweight (like me). It's a SKILL and its better exercise once your technique is up.

If you're having chronic problems with your feet and can't bike, yes swimming lessons are a very good idea.

Re: Awkward

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Swimming when you feel awkward is no fun, that's the truth!

Well, the actual swimming isn't all THAT bad, once I'm in the pool. Granted, attempting the crawl is awkward. :-) What I dislike most about swmiming is the high overhead: TWO changes of clothes AND TWO showers AND a round trip in the car AND having to conform to the Y's schedule. Twenty minutes of swimming costs an hour, and can hose your day if your schedule doesn't line up properly with the Y; twenty minutes of running costs thirty minutes and you can do it whenever you wake up. I don't get how busy people swim. OK, ENOUGH whining from me! Enough!

Honestly, swimming isn't much of a workout until you get your technique straightened out, as you've already indicated.

I have? The way I understood it was that swimming is much more balanced than running: I need arms as well as legs. Once the arms come up to speed I will be able to swim longer. No?

Re: Awkward

[mama-hogswatch.livejournal.com]

Yes, I take my hour lunch break to swim for 20 minutes too! (I'm a very avid and enthusiastic swimmer!)

Yes, once you get your practice in, it's a great full body workout. If your cardio health is good, you'll be able to push yourself nicely once your strength catches up.

Where swimming has a bad rep (and you can click on the Fitness tag on my journal for lots of rants about it) is in the weight loss department. There are a lot of factors there that I do not think are adequately explored. But from your user pic, I doubt that's even a concern for you!

Re: Awkward

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you enjoy it so much! You have a pool nearby where you can do lap swimming on the lunch hour? That's pretty cool.

I really do need those arms, though, huh? :-)

It's true that I'm not looking at it as a means toward weight loss. I'm mainly after cardio health, because with messed-up feet, swimming is probably my best shot at that. I'm otherwise *sooooo* prone to becoming a complete couch potato!

Re: Awkward

[cassidyrose.livejournal.com]

It's a SKILL and its better exercise once your technique is up.

It is also better exercise once one can do it for longer and more consistently. Interval training is also key for the more advanced swimmers. (I swam competitively for many years as a child and teen, then again recently as a master's swimmer). Increasing yardage as one progresses, doing a variety of strokes, and doing a mix of middle and long distance training with sprint training all make it more challenging in terms of cardio and strength.

Re: Awkward

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I think what I most want out of swimming is cardio fitness. Secondary to that I need to avoid injuring myself, which is a good reason to learn the "correct" ways to swim!

Strength and speed aren't primary goals for me, although I recognize that I may need to work toward those to keep my interest up. I admit I'm very intrigued by things like the swim from Alcatraz. Having a challenge, even a major one that will take time to reach, does help keep me going. I'd need MUCH more speed (and thus probably much better technique) to ever tackle something like that!

[davidlevine]

I never learned to swim, despite years of classes at school and camp, until I finally had an instructor who taught me the breast stroke instead of the crawl. The crawl is an awful stroke -- it's hard to learn, it expends a lot of energy, it's a bad choice for survival -- the only thing it has going for it is speed. Which is why the "freestyle" events in the Olympics are all crawl -- no one who's trying to win a race would choose any other stroke. But for exercise or recreation or not-drowning, the crawl is the worst possible stroke. Good for you that you've found something else that works (which is not to say you couldn't find something that works better for you).

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

In comments to my previous post, aliceinfinland echoed that sentiment: her classes didn't teach other strokes until the student could master the crawl, which was frustrating.

I'm torn between working for speed so that I can stay out of the lane with the nearly-stationary people and working for endurance so that I can get a better cardio workout. Speed = learn crawl. Endurance = don't. Then there's "am I slowly injuring myself with my weird style" (learn crawl!) and "how long do I want to spend of a morning anyway?" (learn crawl! get tired faster!)

So many options, so low a priority! :-)

[rampling.livejournal.com]

Hmmm, I guess I disagree with you about the crawl -- I'd always heard that it's the most efficient, and expends less energy, than other strokes. And I feel that effeciency myself, after having improved my crawl stroke dramatically. I love to relax and glide while I'm doing the crawl.

Checking the web, I find, for example: Freestyle or Crawl: The fastest, most efficient, and most popular stroke. (http://www2.gsu.edu/~wwwfit/swimming.html)

That sounds weird, that they were trying to teach you the crawl at the same time you were learing to swim?! That makes no sense to me. But then I didn't learn to swim in a class. I'd think you should start with a casual version of breaststroke or dogpaddle or the like. Then later progress on to the crawl, when you're ready.

Maybe the crawl isn't everyone's favorite stroke (of course), but it does have some major benefits. My actual favorite is butterfly, but that's hard, and Really Really Really Tiring! But, ohhhh, the flying!! Just don't ask me to do more than one length of the pool with butterfly....

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I think when I learned to swim we started out with Generalized Flailing just to get used to the water. We'd bob, we'd splash, whatever. But the first actual swimming was the crawl. Maybe it wasn't a good, efficient crawl, of course! That's just the general motions we were taught: one arm pulling at a time, head rotates to the side for breaths, flutter kick.

[davidlevine]

Every single swimming class I had tried to start with the crawl. And I couldn't do it -- I kept inhaling water, and I couldn't coordinate my arms and legs. I needed a stroke that brought my head higher out of the water, like the breast stroke.

The crawl is definitely the fastest, and is the most popular because everyone teaches it. I'm not sure I agree that it's the most efficient, but it might be. But it sure is hard to learn.

[nosrednayduj]

You're doing this for exercise, right? Your stroke is probably less efficient than other strokes. So, it's more exercise! If you had a more efficient stroke you'd have to be there longer ;-) Me, I know all the strokes, and usually do crawl for a bit less than 1/4 mile and then turn around (it's in the lake, so I don't have sides) and do "anything goes" resting strokes on the way back. Swimming upwind is a big struggle through waves! But then on the way back it's much faster.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Your stroke is probably less efficient than other strokes. So, it's more exercise!

I like the way you think of that! Woohoo! I just hope I'm not slowly injuring myself in some way. Swimming is my best shot at cardio fitness, so I hope to be able to do it healthily for a long time.

Wow, you swim 1/2 mile in open water? (Er, where "open" means you have wind and waves.) I'm impressed! Go you!

[nosrednayduj]

Well, I'm not really sure. I swim 300 crawl strokes (counting as many as possible, so some would say 150) and then turn around. Takes me about 20 minutes round trip. Who knows how far it really is. I suppose I could gps to the place I usually end up at and find out (three doors down dock in calm water. Less in waves.) I swim only alongside the shore, because I think it's not safe to swim out in the middle of the lake where boats are.

And of course, I don't swim at all now, I wait for June. It's COLD. In a couple months it will be SOLID.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Yes, the open-air swim season in Massachusetts is definitely over for this year!

[firecat]

Assuming you want GAS: The most efficient change I can see you doing to swim "right" would be to learn one of the breaststroke kicks. A benefit would be that since breaststroke gets most of its momentum from the kick, you could choose how hard to work your arms at any point in your workout.

There are a bunch of web pages with animations and videos to show you different swimming styles.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Yes, I bet it would be good to learn a symmetric kick that goes well with the lurching arm motion. A web page would be a great start because I don't have to take time off work (or significantly decrease my precious relax-at-home time) to learn! :-)

[rampling.livejournal.com]

When I swim, I do the crawl for most of my swimming exercise. Ever since I took a community college class and improved my crawl stroke, I believe it made swimming a lot more fun (I'd never have used the word "fun" before that), and the stroke itself more comfy and even relaxing and smooth. I remember back in my swim meet days (I was NOT a swimmer, I was a springboard diver!) the swimmers always swam crawl even for the distance events. I think that's because they'd use a relaxing smooth efficient gliding stroke that they could keep up for a long time. I quite recommend learning a stroke like that, if you can.

Oh yeah, and for the eyes underwater thing, those little swim goggles are quite the thing. My eyes would never sting when I used them.

(And I see I made my other stroke comment on the wrong post! That's what I get for trying to catch up quickly on LJ.)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

The movement through the water is fun enough already, I suppose -- the annoyances are water temperature (great at my Y!), other swimmers, schedule, all the effing WALKING required, and so forth. I think my crazy stroke really isn't too awful in terms of enjoyment. But I know I should learn better technique anyway. I don't want to compete, I don't need speed or endurance, but I do need to avoid injury.

[aliceinfinland.livejournal.com]

I've done that same crazy stroke. It is easier for the abdomen and lower body to do things asymmetrically. However, the best exercise comes from forcing yourself to do things symmetrically and not roll. That's what I learned in Pilates, which I again recommend if you can find a good instructor. (I imagine it could be really boring with a bad instructor.) There is no weight bearing on the feet in the Pilates I did, and you don't have to shower or even change if you were already wearing yoga pants. But you get exercise. And with the right instructor, yoga-like meditation.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

That crazy stroke is fun! And as soon as my arms tone up a bit, from a few decades of inactivity, I could probably do that stroke all day.

But I should be careful and work toward better technique or I might injure myself. What would I do for exercise if a shoulder went out? Yikes.

Pilates does sound good!