How much extra propulsion does optimal roll deliver?

[Zenturtle]

My view of the counterblancing action of the 2BK.

Take some sturdy books. Make a pile about 10 cm high.
Now stand with the left leg on the books. Balance on your left leg.
Let the left arm and the right leg hang down relaxed.
Stick the right arn forward, a bit lower than the Heil Hitler greeting position.
Now, pull the right arn down as fast as possible.
Look at what your right leg is doing when your pull the right hand down as fast as posiible.
Mine kicks forward a bit. Thats a downkick in swinning position,
Thats 2BK timing.

The forward reaction leg kick on dryland is to keep your body balanced vertical.
In the water its to keep the body horizontal.

[CharlesCouturier]

I have not tried your dry meals yet, but promised myself I would before beginning of my next 10 class strip (beginning 2nd week of feb).

Arrrggg I wish you lived closer. You'd be of a great help in helping me developing this concept I'm sure. Keep searching Zen, always enjoyable to read your passion through your posts.

In fact, you know what's ironic? My biggest challenge this semester is a lady that has a synch issue between BR and pull. It's crystal clear. Must teach her the proper timing, then allow for neuro-muscular adaptation and she should go fly. All that stuff isn't just theoretical ideas for me. It's really what I teach (as it's what I believe in).

[Zenturtle]

Where can I find Shinjis dryland cues? ($$$$?)
I find the static walking stuff miles away from the actual swim experience.
Find the dynamics the most interesting.

There is for example a pleasant advantage in the arm recovery part at higher strokerates.
When swimming slow motion, the arm above the water feels ssooooo heavy.
Pushing you down all the time.
At a higher rate, the arms starts to swing over like a stone in a catapult caused by the centrifugal force and helped by body rotation.
In theory the arm could start pulling at the shoulder socket when rotated fast enough. Thats not the case, we are not swimming at 200rpm , but at a higher rate interesting things are happening.
Interesting folks, not saying that a high stroke rate is always better ;-)

[CoachDavidShen]

Originally Posted by Zenturtle

Where can I find Shinjis dryland cues? ($$$$?)
I find the static walking stuff miles away from the actual swim experience.
Find the dynamics the most interesting.

There is for example a pleasant advantage in the arm recovery part at higher strokerates.
When swimming slow motion, the arm above the water feels ssooooo heavy.
Pushing you down all the time.
At a higher rate, the arms starts to swing over like a stone in a catapult caused by the centrifugal force and helped by body rotation.
In theory the arm could start pulling at the shoulder socket when rotated fast enough. Thats not the case, we are not swimming at 200rpm , but at a higher rate interesting things are happening.
Interesting folks, not saying that a high stroke rate is always better ;-)

hey zenturtle, go to http://www.swimlikeshinji.com and check out his shop. there are two dryland video sets, basics and advanced. the price is pretty reasonable.

[Zenturtle]

Ok, thanks.

[Zenturtle]

Hey Charles, about the standing on one leg on books and pull the arm dryland experiment and the power of the pull with a pull buoy or with a kick.

Just reading some bullshit Sheila Taormina stuff

Where does kicking fit in?

Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. This is true for swimming; a swimmer who doesn’t kick won’t pull as strongly under water because they aren’t anchoring their pull. A leg kicking against the water provides the leverage and stability that the core, shoulders, and arms need to pull more effectively.

I knew I was on the right track ;-)

I agrree with a lot of TI principles, but nothing rings as many regognition bells as reading Sheilas stuff.
Dont take this as critisism,
Visist a random pool and take a look at the freestyle swimmers. I guess at least 75% of them are doing themselfes a favor by taking a TI course.

[sclim]

Originally Posted by Zenturtle

Visist a random pool and take a look at the freestyle swimmers. I guess at least 75% of them are doing themselfes a favor by taking a TI course.

I think most TI supporters would agree. Even non mainstream TI types have some agreement, but would vary on opinion with the percentage.

Even Taormina agrees, but the percentage she assigns makes her agreement trivial, as does her rather demeaning assignment of the category of people finding TI useful.

But ZT, for the 25% who would not benefit from TI, presumably because there balance and streamlining is excellent already, where in your opinion would the next step for their improvement lie?

[Zenturtle]

Thats hard to say.
Maybe even 95% of the swimmers could pick up something during a TI course.
Its very personal. Will they swim faster after that course, or swim with more enjoymentf?
Every coach will say he strives for better balance and streanline and efficiency, so can those be special TI principles?
TI teaches a full body connected arm leg inside out propulsion focus more than others perhaps.
I find the vocabulary that TI uses a bit vague. I still have no clue how I can improve my swim with weight shifts, while Sheilas talk about serape drills make much more sense in my view.

I also believe TI is not optmal for all people if they are searching for maximal speed within a reasonable anount of learning time.
Best suited to strong well balanced males, and least suited for shortarmed well balanced aerobic fit females.
Swimming fast with a low stroke count is a very advanced skill that takes years of practice. High level sprinters can do it, but should beginners start at that level?
If aerobic fitness is relatively high, a more scrappy stroke at an elavated stroke rate could be the shortest route to optimal swimming performance, only looking at long distance speed. Maybe TI is better for a certain percentage of people in the long run.
I dont think people with really sinky legs can get by using only a 2BK combined with a slow strokerate.
Besides that, not everybody sees the TI swimming way as the ideal personal style.
If I had to choose between swimming like Shinji or swimming like Shelley-Taylor Smid, I choose to swim like Shelley.
Shinji is a great swimmer with awesome control and awareness, but its simply not everyones cup of thea.

Its hard for me to say how the avarage TI swimmer is swimming and if TI is holding the swimmer back or technique or fitness limitations.
In fact I rarely have seen a TI like swimmer in real liife. I based my opinion on what is available on youtube.

I dont see so much conflict between Taormina and TI in the basic view on good swimming.
She only is more focused on raw speed. She also promotes long effective connectied strokes.
But after that, raw speed requiers, strenght. endurance, hard work, a higher strtokerate and less no propulsion glide time. Even more speed also requiers more kicking.

Just opinions from a non coach off course. A coach may have a different perspective.

[CoachDavidShen]

Originally Posted by Zenturtle

Its hard for me to say how the avarage TI swimmer is swimming and if TI is holding the swimmer back or technique or fitness limitations.
In fact I rarely have seen a TI like swimmer in real liife. I based my opinion on what is available on youtube.

As a coach today and someone who has first experienced TI as a student back in 2003 and seeing what TI is now, i can safely say that TI has undergone a massive positive evolution during those times. Unfortunately, many today still have perceptions on the way TI was years ago and it's changed a lot. Admittedly we have not done a great job at changing our teaching materials during that time like the books and DVDs. That is also changing soon.

Your second statement makes me say that in any method/system/discipline you really have to experience it to have good, accurate perceptions and opinions about it, and you need to also have the right teacher or implementer of the system on you. There are too many people out there who have never taken a workshop or private lesson with today's coaches who are ready to give their opinion about things. This is true for a lot of other things (ie. tae kwon do sucks, yoga sucks, crossfit sucks) but yet these people have never immersed themselves in these systems with the right teacher for long enough to know what "sucks" means. And I have to say that as with these systems and also in TI, you will meet teachers/coaches who are good and those who are not. And some of those will be good but just not right for you and the way you learn.

I would encourage everyone on this forum who has not taken a lesson or has taken lessons years ago to make the effort to find a good, experienced TI coach and to do so now before posting another opinion online.

Originally Posted by Zenturtle

I dont see so much conflict between Taormina and TI in the basic view on good swimming.
She only is more focused on raw speed. She also promotes long effective connectied strokes.
But after that, raw speed requiers, strenght. endurance, hard work, a higher strtokerate and less no propulsion glide time. Even more speed also requiers more kicking.

Just opinions from a non coach off course. A coach may have a different perspective.

There are differences in training for swimming for pool competition where distances are relatively short versus for longer distances like OW, or even the 1500m. and there are a lot of similarities as well.

Still, i would say after reading her book that she advocates a strength first approach and her views on swimming technique are old school where some of the new crew of coaches has changed thinking since then (see http://coachsci.sdsu.edu/swim/bullets/ASCA2009.pdf).

TI advocates a technique first approach - why lay strength/energy on a poor vessel? And also TI has created detailed methods for training technique in swimming, probably the most sophisticated in the world. So TI creates great teachers of swimming as well - where can you go for a Masters in Swimming Teaching?

But still, this all is misunderstood - many TI coaches do train a lot of competitive pool swimmers with TI methods and they work really well. All of those things are employed: kicking, strength, endurance, etc. But again all of that is wasted if applied to a person at the wrong time in their technique development. So that's why i like to add a 4th element to TI training (the other 3 are Balance, Streamline, Propulsion) which i call Optimization - the taking of the other 3 elements into time/distance/speed.

[sclim]

Originally Posted by CoachDavidShen

So that's why i like to add a 4th element to TI training (the other 3 are Balance, Streamline, Propulsion) which i call Optimization - the taking of the other 3 elements into time/distance/speed.

This seems like a great idea. I think most beginners would have a huge problem with balance -- I certainly did, and still do. But as the beginner finally gets it right, integrating it with the other 2 old elements would be important. And getting the mix, the blend of elements for optimum rate of improvement for effort to be just right for this particular student would really maximise the benefit of TI and keep it still working well into the expert stage, I would think.