Swim Secrets book - any reviews?

Is it Swim Speed Secrets by Sheila Taormina?

Good thread on it here: http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/discussion/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=436808&start=1

I've read it and found it extremely beneficial.

Yeah, the thread that RazorTri linked you to was the one I was thinking of, and I'm glad to see his recommendation as well.

I reviewed the book and also put a user review on Amazon.com.

My review for the media outlet I write for is scheduled for later this week.

In a nutshell, I'm impressed by the book for a few reasons. Firstly, for the majority of triathlon swimmers who need a quick "toolbox" of guidelines to tune their stroke for this weekend's race, the book provides that resource. check out page 45, "Vital Elements of the Vital Element", a chapter on quick-fixing the pull phase of your stroke. Read it, do it, swim faster.

Secondly, the book is composed of what feels like "layers" of information. In addition to a quick tune-up the book provides greater and incrimented levels of detail on stroke technique and training.

Something to remember about this book is the author, Sheila Taormina, is literally the consummate student-athlete-teacher. She learned, from scratch, running, cycling, shooting, equestrian and even fencing. Once she learned these sports she went on to compete in the Olympic games in not only swimming (one Gold Medal, '96, Atlanta) but also in triathlon and Olympic Modern Pentathlon.

Sheila bought her first triathlon bike from me and I worked as her mechanic at two Olympic Trials (Honolulu and Dallas). I also worked with her at Doug Stern's Triathlon Training Camp in Curacao in the Dutch Antilles. She is not only a great athlete, coach and inspiration, she is the very best of people and I love her dearly. She's one of those people who bring such positive energy to every interaction she makes.  

I shot this photo of Sheila after she won the Olympic Trials in Dallas as she makes time to chat with a fan- only seconds after graciously dealing with the scrum of reporters at the finish as she became one of America's first Olympic triathletes for the Sydney games, the first ever Olympic triathlon, where she was first out of the water.

I will add that this book really helped by allowing me to visualize how I should pull. I was using a straight arm pull, which caused all sorts of issues. Just simple changes from this book took my best 100y time from 1:43 down to 1:35 without thrashing as much as I was. I can't yet hold this speed for longer distances, but it shows that I'm at least capable of swimming faster than 2:00 in a tri.

My pull is not yet really good but it's so much better than it was. This video Suzanne posted is something I believe will help me over the next hump. http://www.sprinttriathlontraining.org/swimming/how-to-swim-faster-like-uncle-sam-the-army-guy. There was a whole thread on this video but it disappeared? Not sure what happened there.

Sheila focuses on the pull, but I don't think she dismisses body positioning. She just believes the pull is more beneficial says positioning is a topic that's been covered by others in detail.

My hips and legs still sink and I need to somehow fix that, but this book really helped me realize I'm capable of speeds I didn't think I was.

Since the topic of the book as come up again, I wanted to add in my 2 cents worth that: (1) it's a great, effective book that has helped me greatly (and I was coming at this from the perspective of a generally FOP swimmer, who had stalled somewhat in my progress -- so I would think that it would be helpful to most everyone, regardless of current swimming strength), and (2)  I highly recommend digesting the book in small doses. 

It happens to be a very easy and quick read, which makes its temping to pour through it and then get to work in the pool.  I've found it to be very beneficial to read and understand one concept at a time and then take that idea to the pool and have it gel before moving on to the next.  If I try to incorporate too many things at once, I will tend to focus in on the one or two that are most easily grasped, and then the others sort of slip by the wayside.  So many good tips and examples in this book, it would be a shame to read it in one fell swoop, go to the pool, and then only have some of them stick.

Hadn't looked into this, but just bought it on Amazon... thanks for the recommendation/mention.

Andi

The overwhelming consensus is this is a great book, but my humble opinion is otherwise.

Perhaps I'm missing something but found the book to be a one trick pony. The photos are great, the explanations excellent, and her writing style is as easy to comprehend as you could ask for, but I was hoping for more than (paraphrasing), "The pull is the the single most important part of swimming."

As a big Tarzan fan from when I was a kid the Johnny Weismeuller stories are great, but won't likely do much for my swimming. No one swims like that anymore, so while entertaining they're rather irrelevant.

I agree with the last post. The book is fine - I'm sure my pull needs work and her book might help to improve it. But it totally concentrates on one aspect of the swim. So, just know that going in.

You may or may not be missing something. You are right in that she definitely focuses on the pull, but I think she makes a very strong case for why. Also, as RazorTri said, the book's like an onion and should be peeled/digested in small doses ... again, while the main focus is on the pull, there is tons more in the book.

The Tarzan story and photographs make this critical point: in the most important part of swimming--the pull--EVERYONE good, from Johnny Weissmuller until now, with very small variations, swims exactly the same way.

Not sure how closely you read the book; she wasn't saying that your standard stroke should become a Johnny Weismeuller Tarzan stroke.  Her point was that, despite swimming sans goggles and head-out-of-the-water, Tarzan put in splits nearly 100 years ago that would put him at the very FOP for AG and Elite swimmers in pretty much any Tri that you would show up to today . . . on account of the strong pull, so there's something to learn here. 

While there is value in practicing head out/strong pulling drills, this doesn't mean this is how you'll race or swim your standard sets.  Are you suggesting that one-arm, catch-up, fist, fingertip-drag, zipper, and other non-standard stroke drills intended to improve technique are also irrelevant?

I appreciate that you were sharing an opinion, but I think you might have missed a lot of the value in the book (which is fine with me to the extent we show up at the same races!!).

Whoops, it was you and not RazorTri that made the small-dose recommendations. My bad, I stand corrected. But thanks, and a really important point.

She was at our local Triathlon Club this week and she was amazing. Very cool and down to earth. She had incredible technique and explained it very well.

She helped me on a pair of tubes w/ my elbow positioning and I think I got more out of that 2 minutes that the last two months of Masters.

Bought her book and have only read the first couple chapters so far but I like what I'm reading so far. If it is half as good as she was in person, it will be a steal!

My 2 cents; I'd like my money back.  It is not that is a bad book, nor that the information contained therein isn't extremely beneficial because it certainly is.  However, I found nothing groundbreaking contained within it.  Matter of fact, the "secret" (spoiler alert, it's that your pull constitutes 80% of your swim speed) has been spilled, beaten up, hashed, rehashed and preached as accepted gospel all over the internet.  Well, maybe with the exception of TI as it did seem to poke that bear a bit throughout the book.  

I guess, in a nutshell, what I'm trying to say is that I had already received all the information that Sheila touts (and elegantly so) in her book from numerous other free, online sources.  Had I known that I would have gladly rather sent my $18 to TJ and the other fishes around here that have given us this secret ages ago.

Awesome read.  I train with a great coach and squad and he's been telling me how to improve for a long time and I sensed some frustration, I bought the book I looked at the pictures - the visual was what was missing - bang I'm motoring through the water, coach is amazed that it's finally clicked.

All I needed was the visual to back up his words!

Love it!

This pretty much sums up my opinion also.

Mark

I bought the book on Yanti's recommendation. I had heard much of what was in there but the photos made evrything more clear.

For some stupid reason I always thought "High elbows" refered to body roll and having the elbow out of the water as much as possible in the recovery phase.

The underwater pictures showing the arm position cleared up that misunderstanding.

I was worried that she was going to ignore the kick completely until the last section.

I have incorporated some of the techniques and will be adding more.

The only one I won't be doing is the "lat presses" in the pool. I did them at the pool I go to and found out the hard way that the walls were very course. Cut the tops of my toes up pretty good.