If you think about it, since almost all races for young kids are short, the starts are even more important !
I heard a coach on a YouTube video saying there are actually Five swimming strokes : Fly, Back, Breast, Free and Dolphin kick, and I think he’s right.
Now the gala is out of the way (with it coming up I have been saying start off a shallow dive and get into your stroke ASAP) I’ll be trying to get my lad to do at least a fifth of his training on Dolphin kick. The trouble is I am old school and never used to do dolphin kicks for the starts and turns, plus I never really used to do Fly either, so my knowledge of dolphin kick is limited !
fly kick on back (streamlined arms) is easier for training purposes as you can breathe constantly but mix it up. WU a 200 fly kick on back rep isn’t uncommon. and in the build we’d do the single lengths i mentioned above. Id do 16 x 1L of FC/Bk/FCkick/Fly kick or similar mix, all at a good intensity or hard 15 easy to end type things.
think to work on as well is the breakout, a lot of kids break out and breathe, never breathe first stroke out of a turn until you are in a good body position. (also last stroke into turn no breathing)
I forgot to answer the most important thing !
Yes he did, esp on the relay, it was great to watch them celebrating their third as the anchor leg came in.
I kept my mouth shut that they should have got silver if the starts and takeovers had been better !
You’re not the only one. Its one of those things we have to reinforce regularly, as if they get out of habit in training they will forget come race day! We have fun some weeks and every time they forget I add one press up and at end they do their press ups together in the post pool session.
10 x 100m off 1:45
10 x 100m off 2:00 as my core temp rose
Went outside for a few minutes to try and cool down, as I felt so bad
10 x 50m off 1:00
500m drill
1km pull and paddles
I cannot train in a warm pool at all. I used to train at Hillsborough (which is a leisure pool with a 20m lane spool attached but uses the same water) and I could only do 4 lengths (only 80m there) without having to stop…
the lido is 24 , but down to about 22 lately, they clearly haven’t increased heating to match the winter temps! The hospital pool definitely has a bit more of a chill to it as well the past few months
When the new pool in Worcester opened they got the controls for the main pool and kids/play pool mixed up.
At our first session we did a set of 50s with 10s rest (or something like that). After the first half a dozen, we were crawling out of the pool and rolling into the kids pool to try and cool down. Everyone looked like a beetroot.
Other than to point out we are at completely different ends of the scale as to what we think should be banned (I think stuff should only be banned as a last resort and only if it is proportionate and there is a cast iron statistically proven case for it), I really do not want to go any further with this, particularly on a thread about swimming training.
First CSS test for god knows how long this evening.
I wasn’t expecting much but was pleasantly surprised under the circumstances.
6:52 for 400m & 3:15 for 200m giving CSS of 1:49.
My best was 6:2x for 400m and I know I’m nowhere near that after COVID before Christmas and generally inconsistent training before that so I’ll take that for now.
