How can I improve my times (in swimming)?

Question

I currently swim 50secs for 50m free (yes i know this is really bad) since I'm used to doing breaststroke.

yes i do practice ( 5 days a week and 2 days weights training). I want to know ways to improve my technique.
I know about neutral head and body position, streamlining that kind of stuff but I cant catch up with the other swimmers when I'm doing freestyle.

This is my first year on a team but I've been swimming for 5 years, mostly breaststroke and occationally freestyle.

Answer 1

Oh man... easy answer... do you have a coach? If so, ask him to work on your technique. It sounds like your training isn't the problem, 5 days of swim practice (hopefully 5000 yards min?) and 2 days of weights should be plenty to swim a decent 50 free. You're going to be hard-pressed to find help online with your technique because each swimmer has an entirely unique stroke, and its hard to critique your own stroke and know what you're doing wrong (so any advice you do get may be hard to incorporate.) With that said... some pointers and quick-fixes for common mistakes.

1. Breathing: two things. Most importantly, breathing head position. When you take your breath, make sure you breathe to the side without lifting your head AT ALL. You should be looking more or less at the side of the pool with 1/2 if your face in the water. That means one goggle in the water and 1/2 of your mouth in the water... Second, a race tip... don't breath more than you have to. The less breathing you do, the faster you'll go.

2. Kick: especially in the 50 free, the kick is incredibly important. Try to do at least a six beat kick... that means for every armstroke you do six kicks. So when your right arm enters the water you start counting, and by the time your right arm enters the water again you should have done six kicks. While we're talking about the kicks, make sure you have good timing with your kick as well. Ideally, you want to kick down with the foot opposite of the hand entering the water. So when your left arm enters, your right foot kicks down, when your right arm enters, your left foot kicks down.

3. Catch: the most important part of your freestyle, and probably why you feel like you can't catch other swimmers. First, think about how you propell yourself through the water. You move forward when you push the water back towards your feet... this means you want to keep your palm facing the wall behind you as much as possible. I would assume that you probably have what is called a slice in your pull, where you drop your elbos and point your palms straight at the bottom of the pool. Remember, the freestyle pull involves your palms AND your forearms (you actually get 4/5 of your propulsion from your forearms and 1/5 from your hands). So when you enter the water, try to keep your elbow high and bring your hand under your elbow, kind of like you're reaching over a barrel...

4. Rotation: freestyle is all about rotation. Rotate your whole body from side to side. This serves two purposes. First, it allows you to present a more streamline profile in the water. Second, it allows you to reach your hand deeper in the water. Remember, the water is denser deeper, and denser water means more resistence... more resistence means more propulsion...

okay, thats more than enough... if you're interested in more, or want some drills... feel free to email me

[e-mail]

Answer 2

Is this your first year? Practice with your pulls and kicks by using swimming equipment and do all of your laps at practice. Practice your starts and turns as well until you don't even have to think about it. You may be doing something off the block or on your flip turns that's really hindering your performance. You can also lift weights so that the laps won't feel as strenuous while your swimming. Do all kinds of stretches and exercises while you practice.

Hopefully, that helps you a little with your question!

Answer 3

Swimmer-
You've answered so many of my questions so I'll answer yours.... First off, I'm not that good at freestyle. But my times are average at 32.78 in a 50 free. Second, freestlye comes with repetitive practice (which I don't do so that's probaly why I suck.) Any way do flipturns to get a better time and do butterfly stream- line. Hope I helped!

$ iNsTiGAToR $

Answer 4

Look at local pools for stroke and turn clinics. Most public pools offer at least one now and then. Sign up!

Work on your turns, the most time is lost when you do a flip turn. Practice, practice, practice.

work on sprints, start with sets that are just 25s and bust them out as fast as your hiney can move. keep track of your time every time using a split clock. When you see improvement work on extending the sprint to 50's.

Ultimately, practice practice practice.

Answer 5

build strength and practice more freestyle strait untill you want to get out of the pool

Answer 6

Just keep practicing. Do strength building exercises on the side.

Answer 7

Practice a lot and build strong arm, leg, and ab muscles

Answer 8

Practice your sprints!
Just practicing will do nothing if you want to become faster.

Answer 9

practice

Answer 10

Try diving into a shark infested pool!!