Another technique session spent on tumble turns, provoking some thought about how I execute them. Not having been doing them since I was six or whenever swimmers get taught them these days, I have tended to breathe quite late after the flags and take very few strokes between then and initiating the turn. Today I discovered that I could take my last breathe outside the flags, swim to the wall, hit the turn and make ten metres out before my first breath, though I’ll admit that was only once and it was hard work. However, it does look as though taking one last breath soon after the flags gives much more time to achieve a stable body position to go into the turn and perhaps also allows the turn to be initiated just a little further out from the wall, meaning I don’t have to swim quite as far (always a good thing 🙂 and that my legs aren’t excessively compressed when I come to push off meaning that I leave the wall sooner.
Further experimentation is certainly required.
On a side note, I passed 100km for the year today. That’s way lower than this time last year when I’d done well over 200km, but actually because I’ve been doing the USRPT sets my work rate has been higher and I’ve become fitter and faster. I’ve also only been swimming four days a week instead of five and for less time per day. At the moment I just can’t take five days. I get too physically tired. I’ve also missed far more days due to work commitments. In terms of actual time spent in the water I think I’ve swum just as far if not further so far this year, despite allocating some sessions just for practising technique.
USRPT distance this year: 44,900m
Total distance this year: 100,250m