Too Much Catch Up?

[stmada]

Hello All,

Thanks in advance for any advice you can offer. I've been learning TI freestyle for the past couple of months using the newest freestyle book and DVD. I seem to have gotten into the habit of having too much of a catch up stroke. That is, I notice that I have both hands out in front of me when I'm stroking, almost like I am doing a catch up drill. I can control this somewhat when I am fresh and focusing on the concept of "ear hops" but when I start to get tired I sort of default to catch up. I've been told by my coach (who's not much of a TI adherent) that this causes me to go up and down in the water and lose momentum. I also feel like it hinders my body rotation by having both hands out in front of my head so much.

Does anyone have any advice on breaking this bad habit? Thanks!

[don h]

stmada,

you might experiment with front quadrant swimming. the basics are:

1. the lead hand begins to "pull" right before the entering (spearing) hand
enters the water.

2. this is timed with rotation of the body. the side of your body on the same side as your entering hand is your high side. the side on the same side as your lead hand is your low side. as you enter, you should still be rotated to
about 45 degrees. when you enter and extend your arm, begin to roll your high side down. as you begin to "pull" with your other hand (low side) begin to roll your low side up (to about 45 degrees).

3. and so on.

gotta see a client,

don h

[daveblt]

Another thing you could try is to slow down and then stop your recovery hand just a brief moment before it enters the water so you can think about the position of your recovery arm and your pulling arm and a "let's pull and spear in to the water now " correctly timed in your stroke.

Dave

[stmada]

Thanks, Dave and Don. I'll give your suggestions a shot. I probably need to spend more time on the spear switch to get the feel a little more.

On a similar note, I've been working on the laser lead flutter (the superman glide with the hands to the side) and trying to get a good rotation going without using my hands/arms at all. Using a two beat kick to initiate the core rotation I can rotate from my right side to my left side fairly easily, but going from my left to my right I have a pause in my switch. I also have trouble getting a good breath of air using this drill.

Does anyone else have this problem? Should I spend a lot of time with this drill or focus more on skating and spear switching? Thanks again.

[AWP]

Zip through to about 3:00min. of this vid and check out Natalie's Laser lead!
(or watch the whole thing : ) )



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkt31KITQro

[stmada]

Ok. That just makes me feel bad.... :-/

[shuumai]

Originally Posted by stmada

Ok. That just makes me feel bad.... :-/

Visualise, don't emotionalise. hehe