Dr. G Power Testing- Breaststroke & Freestyle

SWIM POWER TEST Date: May 21st, 2011
Athlete: Elaine Krugman
Swim Stroke: Breaststroke
Recommendations
1.You are slightly lifting your head at the beginning of the pullout. Keep your neck extended and watch down during the entire breakout. To keep your neck extended, imagine that you are swimming downhill. The stronger you can keep your neck and head, the easier you will glide underwater.
2.Establish a high-elbow position at the beginning of the pullout, similar like fly pull. Lock your arms in the core and pull straight line backwards. Don't press the water to the sides. Drill: underwater pullout and gliding for as long as possible keeping your body rigid.
3.You are kicking from your knees only, because you are bending your knees at 90 degrees before the underwater fly kick. Don't bend knees as much. Kick more from your upper abdominal down your feet. Fly kick should be short and powerful. Don't lift your feet above the body line before kicking.
4.Don't break your body line by pressing the head down and lifting hips up after the underwater fly kick. Because of that, you create large frontal drag and your swimming velocity drops very quickly. Stay streamline, kick at smaller amplitude.
5.Your underwater gliding should be shorter, because your swimming velocity drops to zero.
6.Keep your elbows close to the body, when moving arms forward. Your arms and hands should touch the body to minimize the frontal drag.
7.Don't lift your head at the beginning of the pull. The longer you are watching down, the less frontal drag you will create. You should lift the head slightly just at the last moment before the breathing. Drill: swimming breaststroke with tennis ball (or with a slightly larger ball) between chin and upper chest.
8.The beginning of the arm pull isn't very effective and your swimming velocity doesn't increase until your arms reach the shoulder line. Most likely, it happens because you are pressing more water to the sides than backwards. Drill: High-elbow catch with pull backwards straight line until the shoulders. Another drill: swimming against resistance in pulling position (stretch cords, parachute, buckets, Power Tower), pulling against the stretch cord (surgical tubing) with slow release. The stretch cord will stop you moving forward, if your arms/hands are not in right position.
9.When you are squeezing arms, it isn't a strong movement. Squeeze your elbows inside more powerfully at the end of the stroke to generate additional swimming velocity. Keep fingertips pointed forward at the end of elbows squeeze.

Swim Stroke: Freestyle
Recommendations
1.You are driving your stroke from head and shoulders, but not from hips. As result, you are losing balance during the swim. Keep your neck extended and avoid any vertical/lateral head/shoulder movements. Rotate more from your hips. Avoid using shoulders and arms/hands for rotation. Drill: both arms on the sides, kicking with fins and rotating slowly from one side to other, catch breath on every side.
2.Use core muscles and hips to generate propulsion. By rotating from the hips, you should help the arm to move underwater stronger and faster. Exercise on land: step up with your feet or knees on the Bosu ball and do pulling sets on land.
3.You are breaking the body line when rotating towards the breathing. Initiate the head rotation from the hips -- rotate hips more for breathing. Drill: Keep one arm on the side, and do strokes with other arm. Breathe into the stroke arm.
4.You are pointing fingertips immediately down at the entry. It opens your shoulders and creates more frontal drag. Try to extent arm forward keeping it horizontal on the surface before bending the elbow.
5.Avoid pressing arms too much down at the beginning of the stroke. Keep your elbows slightly lower than shoulders. After establishing a high-elbow position, pull straight line backwards using core muscles. Drill on land: step up with your knees on the Bosu ball and do pulls using the stretch cords on land.
6.In the pulling test, your swimming velocity doesn't increase until your arm reaches the shoulder line. It indicates that you are not connecting arms to the core muscles (abdominal and lower back muscles) from the beginning of the stroke. Drills on land: pulling stretch cords on land with short stops at the beginning and middle of the stroke.
7.Improve ankle flexibility and power. Drill: kicking with short fins at high intensity in horizontal and vertical positions.

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• Elaine
• Krugman