No Longer an Uphill Swimmer

By KHALED GHELLAL

I recently took up swimming because I failed to master it some time ago. As a frustrated duathlete aspiring to triathlon, I wanted to do it right this time. I read article after article on how to position the fingers, sweep outward, make an s-bend, kick like a mule, and stay relaxed while doing all of this; I guess they meant well, but these methods caused more confusion than anything else.

My "technique" up to this point consisted of beating up the water and emphasizing power in my arms, which I had plenty of. I thought that once my muscles were adapted to swimming, I could move just as fast as that sucker in the next lane, who wasn’t as muscular as me!

Unfortunately, my muscles required breaks every 50 meters and I could never escape an awkward sensation of swimming uphill – not moving at all. I didn’t understand how I was able to lift so much weight and do chin-ups with extra weight suspended from my hips, but was so easily exhausted by swimming. Finally, I gave the TI method a try.

Because I’ve been involved mainly in high intensity sports, when I discovered TI I was fascinated by the concept of doing less but accomplishing more. I bought the book Extraordinary Swimming and basically devoured it. Martial arts swimming? Right down my lane. Breaking a complex movement into “mini-skills” reminded me of wing chun training.

Simply by reading the book, doing the drills, communicating with my body and staying relaxed, I increased my distance tenfold (from 150m to 1500m) within four weeks. My favorite TI drills are the ZipperSkate and ZipperSwitch. Whenever I feel my stroke becoming rushed or unstable, I do a few lengths of those and immediately feel balance and ease return.

I’m excited to attend a TI Workshop, as I suspect that my interpretation of TI freestyle leaves room for even more improvement via expert instruction. Because of the deep satisfaction I have experienced by applying just a couple hints and tips, I’m sure that after a workshop I will be ready to compete in my first triathlon. So for all you desperate wannabe- triathletes like myself – hang in there, there’s hope for us!

Khaled is a 40 year old wannabe triathlete. He lives in Germany and works as technical engineer, often traveling all over the country. His favorite pastime, you guessed it, is swimming, biking and running. Of those three sports, swimming is his absolute favorite, especially since discovering the TI method. Khaled's big goal is to compete in his first real triathlon (olympic distance) this summer. Khaled would like to thank TI because that goal isn´t that scary anymore. In the past Khaled has done a lot of different sports including wing chun, power lifting and long distance running, but nothing seemed quite as satisfying as swimming. Greetings from Stuttgart´s Uphillswimmer!