Total Immersion (I am a little more sold on the technique)

I'm a Total Immersion Fan....and....it really helps me to improve my swimming time in more than 2 minutes...I love it!!! I have the Book and DVD Video...and...I really recommend to everybody...

I think TI is great.  I've got the DVD (need to haul it out and re-review it again) and it helped me SO much with my swimming.

I read one of the TI books and it helped my swimming immensly.  As mentioned above, it does focus on efficiency.  However, once you get the basics down, then you can start working on speed through drills.  I spoke with a guy here on BT and he did wonders for my speed. 

When I took up triathlon last year, I was under the illusion that I could swim. I took swimming lessons every summer as a kid, people told me I had great form, and I didn't swim a length for about 15 years. Reality set in during the first swim session with our training group. I picked my head straight up for every breath, my body was at a 45 degree angle in the water, and two lengths was about all I could manage without a rest.

My coach is not a certified TI coach, but knows and recommends the drills and principles. Though some web research and his suggestion, I bought the book and the "Freestyle Made Easy" DVD. I was hoping to do a triathlon in about two months, but 750 meters of swimming was daunting. I was totally motivated to learn how to swim and devoured the book and video. It took me about two hours to try all the drills, though some were difficult to understand just from reading. That's when the video was useful, though you had to take mental notes and be able to recall what to do in the pool. I learned to float, and switch from side to side (rotating, what a concept!), but the actual swimming wasn't a lot better.

My husband was having the same difficulties as I was, so we decided to take the TI clinic a couple of hours from where we live. There were three great instructors who talked about balance and efficiency, and learned what people's fears and motivations were. One guy was a fireman at SF Airport and needed to be able to do water rescues, but was terrified of swimming. Many participants were triathletes of varying abilities, and some could swim well already.

The sessions included underwater filming of your stroke before and after the clinic, about 4 hours of pool time practicing the drills, some lectures and videos, and finally swimming a length of the pool. Every participant improved and had a better "feel" for the water and how to move through it. I found it very useful to have individual help with the drills that I didn't quite grasp from the book and video. Plus, you spend two whole days thinking about and practicing swimming, which you might only accumulate in a few weeks of training. I think it really accelerated my swimming progress.

This year, after a winter of good swimming practice, my husband and I both have swim times 10 minutes faster than last year. I passed my book and video along to a friend who was learning how to swim and he was soon doing multiple lengths and flip turns. I also came across a review of the system by Tim Ferris who found the book very useful as a beginner.

http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2008/08/13/total-immersion-how...

Try it! You'll learn a lot.

Tall girl - Thanks for the info.  The videos on that link are a bit scary because breathing is definitely one of weaknesses and you can barely see that guy breathe. 

I first started training for tri's last Fall and hadn't done any freestyle in 25 ish years. My first tri I used breastroke. I could swim maybe 25 yards freestyle at an ugly 45 degree angle, missing getting air most of the time.

So in June I attended a TI clinic, swam a lot June and July and did a 1650 yard swim in 34 min for my first Oly at the end of July using TI freestyle the whole way. I did a 28 min mile a few weeks ago and can swim 2.4 miles continuously with freestyle now. I am not what one would consider fast, and I have a long way to go to master the techniques, but man 2.4 mile swim using freestyle after 3 months was a bit more than I had hoped for. Next month I am doing my first HIM.

They have an advanced class for folks who have a pretty good handle on the basic technique who want to now work on improving speed. I don't feel I am at that level yet, but maybe this June I will take the advanced class. The class was sooo much more helpful than the book or the video because the instructor would video you under water and critique your form and help you in the water in real time to get in the correct position for the drill. In my opinion well worth the money.

It is not the only way to learn and there are some reeallly fast swimmers on BT who don't use TI, but it is probably the easiest way to be able to cover the distance at a 1.5 mph ish pace with the least amount of time put into training.

TI helped me improve my effeciency, balance, and attention to form. I did only a few of the exercises in the book.

That's one of the skills demonstrated in the DVD where you breath from a little pocket of air caused by your head moving through the water surface. Sticking your head out of the water to breathe causes you to lose your horizontal body position. You should barely rotate enough to breath so that one goggle is still in the water. It's definitely a skill that takes getting used to but really improves your efficiency a lot.