Types of tapers

Taper is the period of training prior a major swim meeting during the season. Taper starts immediately after the most intense training has ended, and the swimmers continue with reduced training that will supposedly allow them to recover and superadapt. Up to this day there are three categories of tapers that competitive swimmers use.

Four easy steps to freestyle [video]

Today's post is about freestyle and how to learn it for the beginners or improve it for intermediate swimmers. It’s something I wanted to post for a long time now but since the swimming facility in my home town was closed for eight months it was impossible. In the following video I present 3 freestyle drills that will help you learn how to breathe properly and how to move your body during this stroke. Before you start practicing these drills you should be able to balance in the water and can put your face in the water.

Neck pain in swimming

One of the most common injuries in swimming is neck injury. Although swimming is a low impact exercise, it depends heavily on technique. That means that swimming badly will affect not only your speed and efficiency but will also lead to pain and stiffness. Neck pain and headache can be the result of several factors associated to your technique. Swimmers who suffer from neck injuries feel a constant, dull ache that may be present in the back of the head, top of forehead, behind the eye, in the temple region or less commonly, around the jaw or ear. Usually associated with neck pain, stiffness and difficulty turning the neck. Other symptoms may be present such as numbness, dizziness, nausea or light headedness.

Aqua fitness equipment

According to the Aquatic Exercise Association there are five types of equipment that professionals can incorporate into their aquatic programmes. All professionals should know the proper use of equipment, which means understanding the function, purpose, limitations, properties, safety factors, and biomechanics of the equipment.  

Lyles takes charge as New Zealand national high performance coach

Swimming New Zealand has hired David Lyles, the head coach of the Shanghai Swimming Team, to be their new National High Performance coach. Lyles was the head coach of the University of Bath swim team from 1997-2005. After that role, China brought him in to lead the Shanghai Swimming Team, which also included duties with the Chinese National Team. Lyles swimmers had been selected for 5 of the 6 last Olympics Games and he has also put swimmers on the Chinese National Team for the 2010 and 2011 World Championships. He also trained two out of the four members of the bronze winning relay team (4x200 m free) at the 2012 Olympics Games.

Sunday's motivational quote 5

EnergyAustralia announces FINA and IPC teams

With the EnergyAustralia Swimming Championships just over, the Australian Swimming Federation announced the teams that will represent Australia at the 2013 FINA and IPC World Championships in Barcelona and Montreal respectively. Michael Scott, Swimming Australia Director of High Performance, said: “We’ve seen more than 20 athletes produce personal best times to gain selection for this year’s FINA and IPC world championships and that’s a really promising sign. We’ve got 86 days until we compete for Australia in Barcelona and the challenge now is to improve further on the standards that athletes and coaches have set themselves this week.  The next stage is about being professional in everything we do including enhancing the performance culture of the team.”

Mental preparation for swimmers

According to Mike Edger mental training is the segment of sports psychology that concentrates specifically on helping athletes break through the mental barriers that are keeping them from performing up to their peak potential. A lot of coaches and swimmers avoid to use mental training as they feel that it has nothing beneficial to their performance to offer them. As we all know great performances is a combination of technique, training, nutrition, and psychology. So I say that developing a mental preparation routine will only help swimmers improve their performance.

Two techniques for cold water acclimatization

Acclimating to cold water during an open water race is a crucial component for all open water swimmers and triathletes. That’s because the body heat loss in cold water, for a non-exercising body, can be up to two to four times greater than the heat loss in cold air at the same temperature. When you exercise in cold water, swimming for example, the heat loss from your skin can be 70 times greater than air of equal temperature.

There are two ways to lose heat during cold-water exercise, and these are due to both conduction and convection. Conductive losses are direct losses from one molecule to another through a liquid, solid or gas. Convective losses depend on how fast water (or air) moves past the body.

Race tactics tips for young swimmers

Do you coach development and age group swimmers and they don’t know how what to do during a race? This post is about general guidelines for constructing tactics for the 50 m, 100 m, and 200 m events. Of course there will be adjustments from one coach to another, one swimmer to another, and one stroke to another, but these guidelines are the general rule of thumb that coaches and their young swimmers should follow. These tactics should be practiced in daily training so that swimmers arrive at a meet knowing their race plans and feeling comfortable about what they want to do.