Why?
Buoyancy shorts are for tiny fragile egos, who can’t position their body in the water.
Absolutely brilliant when dealing with a hip impingement or similar, otherwise, nein danke.
As a noodle armed man, who struggles lifting a matchbox, but can leg press 3X of his own body weight, I tend not to kick 
Save those legs for the running and cycling.
Just a little flutter now and again.
Also, kick is WHACK. Ruins your Strava average pace. And therefore your fragile ego. See above.
Fins are class, but addictive. It’s lovely doing 1:15/100m for no effort at all
Bastard tumble turning in them like 
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is that all 
get the arena power fins, i was knocking out 27s 50’s last week , mental things and very light also! I was kicking 20sec lengths! The good thing was i took then off and was swimming faster than before having them on.
cheat shorts are crap, but if it means someone swims more good strokes, good on them.
and sort your fragile ego out Stalin
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Nah, I just hate kick.
Absolutely buggers me up, so I don’t bother 
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Triaflete!
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One of the interesting things in the Gary Hall book is about kicking. He refers to it as your base speed and gives a convincing example. I get that is pool swimming but still, I reckon it is relevant. That and @Hammerer says “improve your kick!”.
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From the SlowTwitch thread, but is it really that simple? Or more specifically, at what point does just swimming more work, as apposed to technique training?
e.g. if I’m swimming 2min/100, I assume swimming 50K a week might get me faster, but there are probably some stroke corrections that would make more sense. What about 1:45, 1:30, 1:00? At what point does the balance shift from getting the techniques right, to just swim more?
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For me I started off at 2mins / 100 back in 2007.
By 2010 I was 1:30/100.
That was just a six week total focus of 10-12k per week.
A few years off, swam a bit, back to 1:30.
Again, a few injuries and CBA saw me slip to 1:45.
A few weeks back in the pool and I’m at 1:30 again.
Not sure what all of these stroke corrections are of which y’all speak 
Arms move. Body turns. Breathe 3/5 and turn. Maybe kick a few times.
That’ll do.
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It’s a constant mixture of both at every level, doing 2k of drills 3 times a week, will make you good at doing 2k of drills; doing a 2k straight swim with poor form will make you good at swimming with poor form, so it needs mixing up but bottom line triathletes don’t swim enough good strokes to engrain it before they stress those strokes and revert to type, hence the plateau. They have missed 10 years as a kid, which has enabled a level of mobility that AoS have long since lost, and permanently embedded skill development. Kids start at say 8, in a decent programme it’s all short so they don’t fatigue and fall apart. We race lengths in training, competition will be 50s and that gradually builds until they are around 14-16 entering top squads and building to that headline mileage. I am a believer that to become a good AoS you must relive that early childhood, although one of the disadvantages of this is that adults have fully developed physiologies, and typically poor RoM. Whilst there’s limited study it’s believed that kids produce very little lactate and do not have many type 2a and b muscle fibres so short is always “aerobic”. An adult if you say do lengths is likely going to push too hard.
Perfect world scenario, adult triathletes should go back to being a kid, doing lots of short reps at steady pace, 30min - 1hr sessions regularly, build the base of good skills. I’d get you tomorrow and say no races until next year, 5 days a week. We’d be doing lengths, stroke counting, with fins then without fins, paddles, using pull , but not floaty pants 
we’d add daily mobility work, and we would spend 6 months on this minimum!
Regarding what times to switch focus, its not polarised, Ian Thorpe got individual gold and silver in 2000, he wasn’t happy so went away and spent 6 months rebuilding his stroke, he came back and got double gold so even the best in the world is taking lengthy time out to target stroke work! Problem is how many here would be willing to forgo tri or other sports and go back to basics, even be able to afford to just swim every day for a minimum of 6 months with a teacher/coach 1to1. Its about priorities for age groupers, and fun, but if you want to be elite and competing at the top level and only swimming 1:40 / 100 for your races then you need to take a couple of steps back and reflect on how to achieve that illusive 1:10-1:15 / 100 for 3.8km
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Thanks, interesting. I guess it comes down to fun, I quite enjoy swimming, don’t enjoy drills so much. But I would enjoy swimming more if I was faster! Especially open water where something is not translating and I’m pootling around the lake slower than anything I do in the pool.
A bit like @Poet (just slower) I can take a break from swimming and then get back to my current plateau after a just few weeks back.
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that’s always key for all of us, its why, unlike poet, i don’t have an issue with floaty pants. If it makes someone swim more and enjoy it then that’s all good. whether its optimal i another question.
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AOS & I’m still stuck on how to achieve it for 0.05km 
Which I guess is what you’re saying
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I found the key to that was more OW swimming 
I just went down every week and blasted out 4km.
Worked a right treat!!!
6th in AG out of the water at IMUK 
(Ignore the rest of the day 
)
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Yeah, I’m not blasting anything. Turnover is lower, I’m just cruising around. Think it might be a temperature thing, water is still only 17C, I just don’t feel like putting any effort in. And when I do I don’t go any quicker.
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Had to do 6 lengths of kick in Tuesdays session. No float, arms by your side. Fucking torture (no fins for me either)
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0 arm drill? So you rotate as if swimming?
If so thats one of the best drills out there
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Yep, rotating to breath, it was tough!
This progression is excellent also. 200-400 total of this!
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I can’t tell properly, but on the first length, are his hands doing anything (like a little flutter) under the water?
The 0 arms drill, a small scull is acceptable just to help propulsion and rotation a little but better without. Its one of those drills that is hard to do wrong as even doing it badly, the body adapts to make it better. Do 4 x 50 (200m) of this progression and the final full stroke 50 will feel great.
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