O.K. Now, when I try to help somebody with their technique, I want to be as close to perfect swimming posture as possible all the time. The freestyle in that set is aerobic swimming. And she didn’t have a kick. (QUESTION). One of them is a balanced drill on kick boards, and we started out with about two kick boards and those kick boards were going all over the place. Now, that’s getting a little better. It’s not perfect. The swimming line. Those are the best drills. O.K. You want to keep their head neutral, in line as much as possible, and they take a breath, they’re here, staying in line, but they don’t go back negative with their chins. Now, once you’re swimming, trying to break a world record, you’ve gotten your posture line and balance all lined up. It’s all up in here and if we get this right, legs straighten out to about the right distance, they stay shallower, and it’s… I mean, I don’t talk about how much to press down, how much you bend your knees, working up very much. Now, taking one vertebra at a time down, you’re working on the muscles, the correct muscles to give you a flat back. Once you have mastered this drill, you will have pretty much learned all the technical aspects needed to swim butterfly. Now, there’s an exercise you can do. So that 55 is comfortable. So, those are just some butterfly sets that we do. Just Melvin Stewart? Misty Hyman, on the other hand, has been 4.44 for a 400 butterfly in practice, and she can keep her rhythm going for much, much longer. I think that vertical dolphin kick has been a real important part of our training program. Now, once your hands pass through this part of the stroke right here, they get right down to here, once your hands pass the mass of your body, all you have is your hands. They’re not releasing their back. I’ll use that. Flat back. And there’s not a swimmer alive… I don’t tell them about the 8 100’s. I kind of try to warn athletes before you use any kind of equipment not to rely on it for their technique. Starchy? Yes sir. The middle of their back. Number 1 is posture. (QUESTION). So, as a result, Jenny has done quite a bit of aerobic swimming with backstroke. They don’t like it, but we are getting away from it a lot. So, I’d make your intervals a little bit slower, make your distances a little bit slower, and, you know, require a certain number of kicks off of every wall underwater, and then put some buoys out there. And Jenny is a little bit like this. Pablo Morales (USA). If your technique is proper. Let’s go through some of these drills, John. No, I absolutely think that we ought to… that if I were coaching an age group team, I would teach them to breathe every stroke cycle so that their breathing is just part of their body rhythms. And then, you can dolphin kick streamline vertically. You can work in your abdomen and raise your diaphragm up and kind of take your rib cage in and have a flat back that way, or you can use your soleus muscle down here, and if you use that soleus muscle, you leg’s going to drop. The right side over there is Susan O’Neill from Australia. Come on now… not all the time are these perfect. Then, I come back this way and I come back here to this line. In other words, just because they put fins on, doesn’t mean they emphasize their kicking. (QUESTION). But it really does strengthen your core tensions and, but again, any tool you use in any stroke, in my opinion, you don’t want to rely on paddles or fins or zoomers, or whatever, for your technique. O.K.? Young kids in our camp do these drills all the time. Yes sir. We’ll have some drill that’ll show you that. Here are some excellent drills to improve your butterfly. Here it is again. Real important concept. What did that mean? Let me go over here just a little bit with some training sets that we had enjoyed doing. But don’t let it just be that they’re going through the motions. Side and front view. Butterfly is such a feeling stroke that it takes a while to get it done. Practical exercises, professional tips and a whole load more! You know, one of the things we’ve done this summer, by the way, is, you know, Misty often kicks on her side and somebody said, one of the studies said that if you’re kicking on your side, in the transition to your front sometimes you lose momentum. And then you have to realize that speed is determined by the body tensions that you carry. I am a member of the Amazon Associates Program and I will earn a commission from qualifying purchases at no extra cost to you. It is very much appreciated. Now, John, let’s go ahead and put in Lynn’s tape. A swimming posture is established starting here in the midsection. One vertebra at a time up. That’s why Summer Sanders was great at it. What happens when I’m back here? That’s one of the reasons you want your arms out in front as much as you can have them in butterfly. So what we’ve done is early in the set we’ve worked on speed before they got tired. Programs and services are provided to ASCA members through the national headquarters. Techniques. O.K.? Line. She was 30.8 at the Pan Pacific championships. You reach toward the corner, sweep out, reach. And then a 50 butterfly on a minute, then 3 300’s, a 100 butterfly, 3 300’s, a 150, 3 300’s and 1 200 butterfly and she was under 2.14 on that. It’s different. It took too much air. Angie Westercreig — I don’t know if some of you know Angie, but she made the 1992 Olympic team at 28 years of age, she was in her fourth Olympic trials and it was a pretty amazing swim. And you’re going to have to change your intervals a little bit because it’s hard work to be underwater there. When you’re teaching your children about good posture, they say, hey, I don’t want to do that, that’s uncomfortable. How far out in front you set your anchor, because what you want you do is set an anchor here and then undulate your body over that anchor. … without a breath. Aim: to practise the arm action whilst moving through the water. If it’s traveling back here, this direction, then you’ve got to change directions. And when I say release, your hands are traveling here and you can go ahead and let them release here. She would win golds in both races (and a medley relay gold) in 1984 after missing the Moscow Games in 1980 when the United States boycotted. Because she doesn’t go fast enough breathing every stroke. She’s not going to do phenomenal high-level repeats in practice. There’s room for improvement in the second length. You can do it with your arms folded across your chest here. She had to come up more for the time for her arms to get around here in front. The national headquarters for the American Swimming Coaches Association is located in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. In flaring out just a little bit more. I mean, she’s paralyzed when she’s trying to do that. Without a doubt. Come on over, upload your videos of you swimming and get some tips and advice. The butterfly is one of the most difficult swimming strokes. No, it’s all in relation to their body, in my opinion. –Chest, body, and arms –Dynamic action •Set up in order to shoot into your line –Want to maintain as much speed as possible The reason I wanted you to see that, and then I want you to watch it a little bit more critically at the end. ", Sign up for the Swim Teach Newsletter and get  Free Stuff, Top Tips, and Loads More  -Straight to Your Inbox, #1 The Complete Beginners Guide To Swimming. When we were doing this, Vera said Oh, people are going to think this is really easy, but when you’re on a board, on those boards like that, unless you really have control of your body and your balance, you’ll be flying all over the place. The emphasis is not in the kick. If you could do it, Jenny can’t, Summer could. This is our favorite butterfly drill, hip delay butterfly. But she does it less than she used to. The second thing I do is I might put a pool buoy on them and have them swim butterfly and say I don’t want you to kick at all. Jenny felt like this drill really helped her a lot. On every fourth kick, complete a single stroke with one arm, keeping the other arm pointing straight ahead. Set the anchor. So you establish your rhythm down here. You’re going to get up on top of them. Jenny Thompson is a very good practiced swimmer, but she’s so big and kind of heavy in the water and everything. Email: asca@swimmingcoach.org, 6750 N. Andrews Ave. It’s a great way to learn to set your anchors. By the way, what happened when I did this. I very much enjoy being a member of ASCA, and I find all of the materials valuable in my quest to become a better coach. Do this a little bit? You establish your rhythm with your arms down at your side, and then release, bring your arms around in front, and then go back right back into rhythm. Well, what happens is the axis… the butterfly is swum up here. I was reflecting on the drive home how much I appreciated the time that you took to address all of our questions. But that’s the best average she can hold. She’s either flutter kicking on her back, or she’s dolphin kicking on her back. Drill, Swim, Sprint - Butterfly Variant Workout Description: This stroke workout has swimmers progress from stroke drills, to swims (where they practice perfect technique), to stroke sprints (where try try to hold technique at racing speed). The reason I have her doing this tape is she’s awesome right here in this drill. Keep the chin back, as close to in line as possible. Need to know what mistakes you might be making? Both sides, huh? So you want to do the flat back routine from the midsection, from the gut. All right, now look, flat back is where you start. So, we do shorter things with her. The whole key is to swim faster longer. Yes, sir. 3) You press the chest down in the water, then release it. And peel up here like this. Where does she go? Maybe that’s why she’s a 209 200 butterflyer and Jenny doesn’t swim the event. Without a doubt. The recovery in butterfly can help with the distance per cycle. Butterfly . It’s a hip stroke. But the key there, again, is that those 6    be 100 percent effort and then you go right into the 8 100’s freestyle, 10 seconds rest, best average. They don’t ever have their anchor until they’re here. That’s even for younger kids. But I think it’s important to monitor the stroke count, and in a 25 yard pool, I’m working with in college swimmers something like 8-10 strokes a length. Ladies and gentlemen, it’s by far faster to be doing underwater body undulations than it is to swim on the surface for many, many athletes. She’s really worked on that part of things. And that may be the only thing they do right in camp. Have the energy flow out the mono fin. It’s forward and slightly below. I don’t want her to kick her legs. And that was a pretty amazing set. Now, the next set is a really tough set that a lot of people would say, Aw, that doesn’t look too tough. Taking a breath. Her kick was kind of like this. What you want to do is be undulating from up here, high in your body. Johnnie could probably tell us. Jenny does do distance butterfly that way. Our belief is that butterfly is a body stroke. Now, she is not jumping off the bottom. Butterfly Swimming Technique - How to swim butterfly. Master the Butterfly, the most notoriously difficult swimming stroke, with all four of Speedo's superb training videos in one. You want to swim butterfly as much as possible, on the line. Right here. I think when they do they’ll fly right under the world record in the 200 butterfly. That’s a real good set. You need to teach the technique of underwater swimming. There were some people watching. The following video illustrates this drill: Back in 1992, her emphasis was back here, and she kind of had a hitch in her stroke and she had to really work to get her arms around. A limited number of arm pulls can be achieved with this practice. But that’s what we value there. Now this is underwater recovery butterfly. But the reason we developed the arm lead hip delay butterfly, where you establish the rhythm up here and then you sweep and then you come back to here is so that you don’t get used to stopping back here in the back. Kind of like you’re on a surfboard and you’re just going around like that. When I’m back here like this, at the end of a race, I’m swimming uphill instead of swimming on the line. The butterfly stroke is one of the most physical and challenging strokes in swimming. This is a vertical butterfly under water. Actually, she does get a little bit better on them. We don’t kick with a kick board. Or am I just full of baloney? We dolphin kick on our back with our arms out here sometimes, and we dolphin kick with our arms down at  our side. Aim: to practise and develop an undulating action whilst moving. So rhythm in front in butterfly. The first great drill for the butterfly is the single arm butterfly. Head lead undulation. Never releases it. But I do think there’s a real lesson to be learned when you’re back here and you learn how to recover from here. The other person who has influenced me a great deal is Bill Boomer. It is an entire body motion. Or you can do it out here. It’s not for swimming out of the hole. O.K., there’s six kick boards. KICK DRILLS The butterfly uses the dolphin kick, where the legs move up and down simultaneously resembling the action of a dolphin's tail. She took her breath with her shoulders and body right here. She’s hammering down on the water. Otherwise, you have boards all over the place. So that’s just an exercise I think you can have people do in very slow motion. And that was a pretty amazing set. Does that make sense? See, I don’t care how tall the athlete is, I want him to sweep out right here, fix their anchor early, vault their body over as early as they possibly can, establishing distance per stroke, and then release back toward the line in front. As she slowly brings both arms down at her side, we call this angel drill right here. But it’s a body emphasis drill. Yeah, to be honest with you, Jimmy, I don’t coach from the waist down very much at all. Bring your forearms down. I’ve never coached anybody that breathes to the side. By the “side of the pool”: mimic the mechanics of the butterfly stroke with great precision out of the … Yes sir. This is called head lead undulation. Now this is the single arm butterfly, of course, leading with an arm and then, well, this is three right, three no breath, and then three left, three no breath. I can’t tell you… this looks so easy. Jenny kind of does this some. Get back in front. We want them to be working on their line, not getting negative with their chin. Begin swimming, using the dolphin kick. Jut in the armpits and above. If somebody protects themselves for the end of the set, then the set’s not worth anything. (QUESTION). Now, it’s pretty well locked in. We haven’t quite gotten her where she can release that back right there, and yet underwater she releases great. When you work on stroke rate, sometimes you’ve got to work on stroke rate much higher than you’re ever going to race. Mini-Maxi. Now, she can get back in front much quicker and she is on a line. just in front of you. The other thing I value there is obviously rhythm. She can get faster because she had a bad turn and a bad finish. You throw your arm toward the other end of the pool, and gravity will drop it in the water for you. Butterfly swimming drills are designed to improve your form and technique with respect to swimming the butterfly stroke. Have your arms stay in close right there. Jenny gets pretty close to a minute, but you talk about teaching body tensions and core body strength. She needs to try to do that without her head going under the water. 120 per 100. I want her to be tall through the head. And I’d like the wrists to be just like this. What we’re working on here in underwater recovery is that early anchor. So, release, sweep out here in front, get back in front. I hope to someday meet you in person and shake your hand. Back in front here. 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