Has short course yards affected freestyle technique?

By Jonty Skinner

If you polled 10 coaches in a room and asked them to describe the underwater phase of the freestyle stroke, they would more than likely all describe the stroke with these main emphasis points. 

     The hand would enter and extend along the body line

     The body/hips would be rotated during the hand entry extension

     The hand would either pitch down to initiate the catch or pitch slightly outward initiating the beginning of an “S” pattern pull

     The elbow would be positioned above the hand forearm in a “high elbow position” as the swimmer created the anchor/catch  point

     The body would begin rotating to the opposite side as pressure was applied to the anchor position and the opposite arm exited and was moved forward (recovered)

     The anchor position would sweep in slightly towards the centerline of the body as the recovering hand passed the shoulder line

     The hips would be into the exit rotation phase as the elbow led the arm out of the water while the opposite arm was being extended into the catch position.

Granted there might be a number of different ways to describe this process, but without a doubt the majority of coaches in world would agree on one fact.   That the anchor or catch mechanics should involve an elbow position that is higher than the wrist/hand position.  Looking at figure 1, coaches might argue as to the specific angles of the joints, but I believe all might agree that the upper and lower arm components would be on distinctly different planes.  However, after reviewing underwater footage of hundreds of swimmers, I find that the majority don’t employ this kind of technique at all.  After continuing to ask coaches to describe their opinion of the catch or anchor position I continued to find a huge discrepancy between what coaches were describing, and what was actually occurring in the water.  Looking at figure 2 you will notice that the upper and lower arms are almost in the same plane, and the picture resembles the technique employed by the large majority of athletes that I have reviewed underwater. 

The impact of the straighter arm under water stroke

Although I cannot find a logical sequence that shows the potential evolution from a high elbow to a straight arm freestyle, in many ways the evolution to the straight arm stroke makes sense.  The advantages are:

     It has a greater power (force application) potential over short distances

     It can generate much faster velocities over short distances

     The shorter more compact stroke handles higher tempos very easily

     It has the potential to take a more direct path to the catch lever/anchor position

However, the minuses of this kind of stroke as they translate to LCM swimming are:

     Excessive muscle fiber/motor unit recruitment patterns

     Limited or no use of angular momentum and hip rotation as a source of power

     A propensity to swim with a technique where the catch position isn’t anchored through the body (Use a 2^nd class lever)

     The majority of the muscle load is placed on the muscles located in the arms & shoulders

     Faster depletion of energy sources (glycogen)(opinion with no proof)

     High levels of lactate accumulation resulting in the early onset of muscle fatigue (based on anecdotal observation)

     Limited ability to sustain power for long periods

     A propensity to “drop” the elbow and lose the leverage position when weak or fatigued

The questions surrounding this dilemma that beg to be answered are:

   Were there always a high number of straight arm swimmers? (The lack of under water footage to this point would support that)

   Has there been a distinct path of evolution from the high elbow stroke to the straight arm stroke as athletes adapted to differing training and performance demands. 

   Did the volume based training environment in the 70’s force the athlete’s into a stroke that helped them manage the training environment. (High elbow)

   And conversely did the lower volume period in the 80’s & 90’s allow the straight arm version to flourish and take hold

   Has the increased level of attention to dry land strength programs resulted in a greater ability to maximize the benefits of the straight arm stroke in the Short pool.

I was taught to use a high elbow catch position.  Like many of today’s coaches I took what I was taught as a swimmer, read from books and learned from other coaches and applied that same approach with my swimmers.  Pick up most swim instruction books and you’ll find them describing the same approach. 

Needless to say, I’m writing this article because I have an opinion, and it would be best to remind the reader that the opinion expressed in this article is the opinion of the author and not that of USA Swimming. 

If I was going to choose the major influence that has allowed this straight arm hybrid to flourish, I would put a large part of the onus on our almost dependence on the seemingly easy gratification associated with short course yard racing.  Although SCY swimming has walked in step with the evolution of the sport, it wasn’t until the 1980’s and early 90’s that it began to etch its place within the swimming performance landscape.  The choice of extremely hard work to get a foot in the door gave way to less work, focus on short course competition and get more bang for the buck a lot quicker.  I have written extensively on the way our SCY record progressions have changed through the decades, and have covered in detail how SCY racing is for the most part a different sport that LCM racing.  (See Long Course versus Short Course and a Statistical look……future). 

Although I have no evidence to prove this point, it is my opinion that as we became more attuned to the needs and training environments that promoted short course swimming (lower volume training in the 80’s),a natural evolution or conversion in technique occurred.  It made sense (under the training conditions) for an athlete focused on SCY performance to adopt or gravitate to a freestyle option that was more suited to the SCY racing environment.  Considering the “serial” nature of SCY swimming, the change in freestyle mechanics was an almost perfect fit. 

This is a term/concept (serial) that I stole from Bill Boomer, so like all Boomerisms it needs explaining.  Swimming can be either “cyclical” (something that turns over the same way many times in succession with little or no break) or “serial” (something that is a recycling phase amongst the many parts of a single event).  Put into context, SCY races are a series of events joined together to form a single race.  A swimming phase followed by a turning phase followed by an underwater kicking phase.   Although the same can be said for LCM swimming, the duration of the swimming phases in SCY swimming are very different and although 3+ seconds isn’t a huge break between swimming portions, the combination of the break from swimming and the short swimming duration, make it much easier to sustain a high tempo, using a high force based stroke. 

Referring to Table #1 (Men’s 200 free) you will see that although there is no difference between the non swim portions in a 200 freestyle, but there is a huge difference in actual sustained swim time.  Looking at Table #2(Women’s 100 free) you’ll notice that there is very little difference between the men’s and women’s numbers and although the total race duration is much shorter, the impact of sustained cyclical motion takes it close to the fence line between endurance and power based racing.

Table 1

Table 2

(see earlier articles to view more statistics like these)

Looking at the plusses and minuses, it certainly makes sense that the stroke fits very well in SCY events up to a hundred yards and can be stretched to some degree to the 500yd event with increasing limitations.  When coaches figure out that extending the underwater kicking portion of the push off increases the athlete’s ability to sustain a higher rate during the swimming portion, I believe that the 200 and 500 yd times will drop even more. 

At this point it’s important to note that in this country the large majority of freestylers suffer from a significant drop off in rate as they progress through each lap of their race when competing in LCM.  There are a variety of potential reasons for this effect, but regardless of what that reason is, a drop off in rate during a lap of freestyle can have a considerable effect on the athlete’s final performance. (+- a second in a 200 meter freestyle)

Potential reasons for the stroke rate decay:

     Use of a Straight Arm freestyle technique

     Inadequate training to help the athlete sustain the neural demand

     A poor selection of rates during the race

The quandary at this point… choose the “straight arm” freestyle because it has more force potential in the SCY pool, or go with the slightly less force more endurance based “high elbow” stroke that’s more suited to the LCM pool?  Since it would be extremely difficult to expect that an athlete could shuffle between techniques based on the racing course they planned to compete in, they would be forced to pick one option over the other.  Unfortunately in today’s SCY dominated climate the majority seem to have, chosen, been taught or have gravitated to the “straight arm” version.

How did the “straight arm” freestyle evolve/flourish? (My opinion)

There are probably many reasons:

      Spending the majority of the time training in a short course environment

      An increased emphasis and consequent reliance on performance gratification during the short course season

      Introduction of tougher qualifying time standards/criteria at the NCAA level

      Introduction of the 4x50 relays at the NCAA level

      Movement by many of our elite coaches from the club to the college ranks

      Limited use of under water video review by coaches

      Catch 22 of “if it isn’t broken (swim fast SCY), why fix it”

As many athletes and coaches used performance in the SCY pool as a measure of their success, they became disillusioned as to the level of fitness and freestyle mechanics needed to be successful in the LCM pool.  As more and more athletes struggle with the issue of not being competitive in a LCM pool, the onus of not being able to produce has been placed on a variety of ailments that don’t represent the real problem that coaches need to address.  The following is a short list of the usual suspects, but in many ways these are used as “cop outs” by athletes and coaches as a reason why they don’t excel in both courses.

1)      The summer season is too short

2)     NCAA “out of season” training restrictions

3)     Too much break after the winter season

4)     Athlete body type not suited to LCM competition

I don’t doubt that any one of these taken to excess will contribute to problems in the summer, but I believe that they mislead coaches into not uncovering the real culprit.  #4 is used by far too many athletes as a reason to deemphasize summer training, and thereby entrenching the ongoing problem.

In the following images we’ll look at a few real examples of what the differences look like.  Image #1 and Image #2 will look at the “straight arm” (SA) version of freestyle and Image #’s 3 & 4 will look at the “high elbow” (HE) version of freestyle. 

Looking at Image #1 (SA) you will notice that during the extension of the arm, the hips are slightly rotated but are almost flat in the water.  I have placed a line through the hip bone to illustrate this point.  As the athlete initiates the hands movement towards establishing the catch (lever)/anchor position, it does it with very little break in the wrist joint.  Looking at Image #3 (HE) you will notice that the hips are fully rotated in preparation to use the hips as a source of rotational power.  As we progress to the middle of the catch (lever)/anchor position, we see that in Image #2 (SA) that the hips are still flat, and have had no impact in providing a propulsive force.  The arm is essentially straight, and there is little difference between the plane of the upper and lower arms.  There is little flex in the wrist joint and the hand acts as an extension of the forearm.  In Image #4 (HE) we see that there is a distinct difference between the plane of the upper & lower arms, and that the wrist is flexed slightly off the plane of the lower arm as the swimmer locks in the anchor position.  The hips have begun to swivel/rotate back towards the left side using the rotational torque as a source of power.

In my opinion there are many reasons why the “high elbow” stroke is very attractive, and when combined with the rotational force of the torso, produces an extremely efficient way to propel the body through the water.  The main reasons are:

   Efficient recruitment of muscle fiber/motor units.

   Less reliance on dry land strength.

   The use of the swinging/recovery action of the opposite arm (angular momentum) connected through the shoulders harnesses a naturally occurring source of energy (force) that can be applied to the anchor position with a limited impact on energy reserves.

   The anchor position is connected through the core of the body, and the rotational force of the hips can be used to supply all the energy needed to propel the body forward past the anchor position.

   Systematic use of greater muscle groups to facilitate the process

   Efficient distribution of the muscle load across a broad range of groups to lessen the fatigue effect of any one group

   Lower levels of lactate accumulation. (Anecdotal observation)

   Delayed muscle fatigue

As swimmers have been trained to adapt to or have opted more (naturally or unnaturally) for the “straight arm” freestyle, they have struggled to deal with the issue of adapting to the endurance training needs of LCM competition.  As with racing, the technique isn’t well suited for endurance based LCM practices, and so athletes find many reasons why they don’t like to train in a long course pool.  Excessive soreness and muscle fatigue to name a few.  What is disturbing is the fact that we might be losing potential LCM performers because of the simple reason that some athletes hate swimming long course, they never get used to it, they’re unable to compete with the long course crowd, and quit trying long before they have given themselves a chance to understand the real issues or problems.

The last point that surrounds this issue revolves around racing strategy.  USA athletes have a tendency to race from the front, and more often than not go out ahead of the field and struggle to hold onto their races.  Why does this happen and what can/should we do about it?

        Americans tend to be tempo driven (SCY racing effect) versus efficiency driven.

        Athlete’s who are force based know that in SCY racing they can go out and survive the back half because the level of muscle fatigue isn’t catastrophic enough to dent their swimming velocity between the walls on the final lap.  (They get enough recovery time in the turns)

        Athletes that employ a straight arm stroke have an even greater tendency to go out fast because the natural energy (force application) sources make it feel “easy” and they never seem to question the logic of conserving their resources.  These athletes are affected even more on the back half of LCM races.

        Americans tend to see themselves as the best in the world.  They laud winners and shun losers.  Part of this thinking has translated to getting out in front and trying to stay there.

Because we have so many athletes that are used to going out and being able to hold on in short course racing, we have the large majority of these same athletes using these same tactics in long course.  When combined with the energy demands of the straight arm stroke it can lead to some ugly failures, and just how many times do you have to watch the Australians back half us in a relay before your teeth are ground down to the gums.  Dennis Pursley’s on his third set of dentures.

In closing, I’d like to point out that there is a place for almost everything in this world.   Although it’s my opinion that coaches should consider a return to a high elbow, connected, angular momentum based freestyle, my voice is but one amongst many.  Since there is still much to learn about biomechanics any observations are worth putting forward since ultimately it will be the coaches that have the best opportunity to gauge the value of any point of view.  By bringing these thoughts to the attention of others, I hope to stimulate some debate regarding the subject and hopefully in the long run, we’ll all be better off for it.

Note

In the majority of my articles I have solicited the opinion of others as I weave the fabric of the story.  I would be remiss to not express my thanks for these thoughts and opinions.  In this case I wish to thank those already mentioned in the article, and the members of the Technical Support Department staff.