Preparing to Win - Part 2

Race Tips

Just as a bad stroke can get ingrained in your muscle memory if your technique is not corrected, in the same way, thought patterns also get ingrained in your brain, and either help you or hold you back.

When I run a workshop or a mentorship session with a top athlete today, a lot of what he or she shares is similar to my own experience of stress on race days. Issues range from feeling too much muscle stress just before a race, to fear of failure and sometimes even, fear of success. Swimmers often talk to me about how their focus shifts pre-race, to worrying more about what the person in the next lane is going to do, rather than on their own swim! And then of course, every once in a way, I come across an extremely talented individual, the hardest worker in the pool, who is expected to win, but ends up being the biggest let down, because he or she let a number of these negative factors overpower their natural ability.

Some of best timings even at world meets have been recorded at relay swims. Yes, you do get the advantage of a rolling start, but the biggest factor for swims that shock the world have been that the athlete’s mind is focused on just that one thought of swimming for his team with little or no attention to what others are doing in the pool, and less stress. On a more personal level, there have been times when I have looked at the touch pad display and been shocked with the timings I clocked on relay times. It felt so easy! And that was because my mind was excited enough to ignore pain and negative thoughts that otherwise cloud focus.

Developing race-day equilibrium needs you to recognise the patterns you’ve unconsciously allowed yourself to develop and perhaps even nurtured unknowingly.

5 Tips to a Better Breaststroke

Hello! This is the third in my series of blogs on stroke correction and I'm focusing today on breaststroke, a stroke many of us begin with.

Every swimmer is built differently, some have stronger upper bodies and some have stronger legs. Strength distribution through the body dictates how a swimmer swims breaststroke, and thus every breaststroker will swim in a slightly different way from his competitor. However here are a few key tips to swim a better breaststroke ! Hope they help !

High Elbows:

Making sure you pull through with a high elbow is most important. A lot of swimmers end up dropping their elbows through their pull, thus losing out on pulling as much water back as they possibly can. Dropping your elbows in breaststroke has a lot to do with weak rotator cuff muscles and I always encourage breaststrokers to do external rotation rotator cuff exercises as a matter of habit so they can maintain the high elbow pull with ease. Remember the higher your elbow, the more water you push back and the further you move forward on each stroke!

Head Position:

Each swimmer likes to exit the water at an angle he is comfortable with. I always have watched that most good breastrokers exit the water both upward and forward as well. By this I mean,they do not chest the water whilst coming up to breathe, an error that novice swimmers do often make. Your ability to hit the right angle can be improved by using your head and eyes as a checkpoint. One exercise that's helpful is to try exiting the water with your eyes still looking downwards at the pool floor.Through all the time you spend above the water, keep your eyes looking at the pool and time you spend breathing will be spent more efficiently, and helping you find just the right angle.