Get rid of pull bouy or not?

Pull buoy is a great tool but can become a crutch. Start Using it less in training. As you said, you don't want to get to an OWS that's not wetsuit legal.

I'm guessing that when you drop th epull buoy, that you resume a 6 beat kick which can really burn through your energy reserves if you haven't been doing it. When I swim distance, I have a very easy relaxed two beat kick and have been known especially when wearing a wetsuit to have no kick and just use arms alone. For distance swimming the kick really doesn't contribute a whole lot to your speed, but can really sap your energy. YMMV

I agree with the others, do what you can to get rid of it they way you are using it (as a crutch).
As a part of your effort, you may want to incorporate some kicking only sets into your workouts.

Yes- gradually get rid of it for all but pull drills. But you also don't have to feel like your pool workouts should be continuous swimming. You'll get the most out of workouts that are sets of 50s or 100s with occasional longer intervals.

Great post This is me. I can go forever with the buoy but struggle without it. I have been hoping the pull buoy will build my upper body muscle endurance and when I don't use it, the benefit from using it will show. Sounds like I need to wean myself off of it.

I've read a lot of articles on this and the pros and coaches seem to be split. If you want to become a really good swimmer and you race swimming, lose the buoy. If you race with a wetsuit all or most of the time anything that improves your body position in training and helps you get fitter and faster is a good thing.
I've used a pull bouy for years now and have continued to improve my times. I also do swims without it and bury my chest in the water to counterbalance the loss of the bouy. It works too. But the only reason I swim is to do tris so if it's a crutch I am ok with that. It silimulates the same body position I get in my wetsuit.

I should mention that the only swims I've had to do without my wetsuit were in the States. Most of my local (within 500 k)water temp is in the low 70s.

This may be anecdotal, but I used to do about 600yd pull buoy (6×100) in a 3000yd workout. Was faster with the buoy. Then I misplaced my buoy. Being a cheapskate, I didn't buy another. To mix things up at the pool, I started doing 200yd kick sets (4x50) to keep things interesting. Guess what....my swim got faster. Not a lot, but maybe consistently 2 to 3 secs per 100 yd. I found tge buoylast week, but after 100ydsI felt lime I was just coasting and not really getting much out of it. My 2 cents, but I'm gon a use the PB infrequently at this point. ...just to keep things varied.

I should also mention that I swim faster with out the PB in practice but the PB let's me focus on improving my arm pull which is where most of your speed comes from. With the wetsuit , improved arm pull and no drag from the PB things go very well during a race.

It's what works for me and it gets me under an hour for the 3.8 k.

I HATE swimming with a pull buoy!! IT feels so uncomfortable and unnatural, and makes my body rotation feel REALLY odd!

Wow. I didn't know people used it that much. An entire workout with it is not a good thing! I tend to use it for 300yds and sometimes up to 500 yards a workout. I use them with large paddles to build arm strength as part of my warmup set or for a quick 100 yd "cooldown" after a very hard set before the next hard set.

Wow , so many great answers and inputs. I know i have to get rid of it and its a crutch, but since im only competing in OW with wetsuit my mind is playing tricks on my, telling me to keep using it since i can go on forever with it. When doing OW in wetsuit im hardly kicking at all, just using my legs. Only start kicking last 100-200meters before exit.

I will take all you advice and im gonna get rid of it once and for all.

Wow, just wow. Watched the vidoe a couple of times then went to the pool. What a difference. I swam 1000meters without any problems. I normally have to kick really hard just to keep myself straight. The "hand cupping" worked wonders and i think a got much better balance now. its amazing how much the small things can affect!

I got rid of the pull bouy in all my swim session but one; the long swim. Once a week i do a > 3000 meter and i still use my pull bouy. Would you recommend me stop using it in this session also?

Unless you're truly exhausted from a long run a few hours before swimming or something, I would slowly wean myself off of it. Since it sounds like you can swim 1000m without it now and maintain decent form, slowly build that until you are swimming the whole 3K comfortably without it. (As to whether you should actually be doing a long, slow swim once a week or doing the same distance in shorter sets, that's a somewhat different question.....but, assuming you are going to keep doing the swim, start using the buoy less. One route to that might be breaking the swim into shorter sets (maybe 200-500m), using the pull buoy only for some of them, and gradually working towards not using it at all.)

I don't personally have a pull buoy dependency issue (unless I'm extremely tired from running, in which case I might use it for a longer freestyle set) and can swim faster and more comfortably without it, but I have used the approach above when recovering from an injury which made swimming difficult and painful without the extra buoyancy from a buoy or fins.

Every tri club swim session I've done involves 200 -400m of pull buoy. But only to allow me to focus on body rotation, catch and pull.

As said, ditch the pull buoy, you won't be racing with it!!

You do NOT want to be in the position to swim without a wetsuit if you NEED it :p

You will be a better swimmer, even in a wetsuit, if you stop using it as a crutch. Other than as part of your warmup, I'd suggest you quit using it all together. Your balance will improve.

Edited by gary p 2015-09-08 8:47 AM