Seal vs Sea Lion (Page 2)

An effective six-beat kick should provide somewhere around 25% of your propulsive force.  With all due respect, doing a six-beat kick without deriving some propulsion from it seems like a big waste of energy.   

I guess my suggestion would be to have a coach take a look to see if there are any easily-identifiable fundamental issues that might help improve the effectiveness of your kick

Mark

Yes he is, and yes he does (so it's no coincidence that he gets beat by everyone in the pool).....and it will be more pronounced in open water where a strong kick is an essential part of getting out of the washing machine in any type of decent race.

It cracks me up that these discussions always break down to "triathlon swimming" vs. "swimming"......as if triathlon swimming is special swimming. LOL

Not suggesting that a 6-beat should be used throughout an entire race.  Our coach has us practice race strategies where we use it at the start to gain some separation from the field, then settle into a 2 or 4 beat "cruising" pace, shifting back into a 6 beat either to pass or at the finish.   We do sets where we practice doing accelerations and decelerations to target tempos mid-length in the pool (rather than at the wall to better simulate OW).  

Our coach is big on sharing "elite" strategies and techniques with us. Not everyone has the talent, ability or motivation to pull all of the stuff off, but I think being exposed to it does help even at the AG level.

Mark

Swimming is swimming but you have to admit they have different end goals.  In a swim race, you are burning every match you've got with the goal of finishing completely spent.  The goal of a tri swim is to finish as quickly as possible without digging yourself into a hole.  A strong kick uses a lot of energy.  If you can minimize that and it only costs you 30s in your swim time then overall you may be ahead at the end.  You have to find the balance of what gets you to the swim finish the fastest vs setting you up for the rest of the race.   BTW, I'm not saying don't kick to save your legs, I'm talking overall energy usage.  

Edit to add that in a draft legal race that 30s means you miss the bike pack so it's a completely different strategy.  Same for the pointy end of a fast sprint - you probably aren't making up that 30s.

Yeah......I find that I no longer think of triathlon the way I used to.  Since everything I am around is DL and sprint focused the idea of what is important and what isn't is vastly different then long course racing.  Then too, I find that most people who focus on long course don't really have a clue about what short course strategy comprises.  I enjoy the discussions.

Still.....fast swimming is fast swimming.......fast triathlon swimming is a bastardization.

LB, I think the other thing you need to look at is swimming has evolved over the years.  What you have been exposed to with Jr is a lot different from what someone in their 40's and maybe 30's was taught.  I showed one of my older brothers a video of my son swimming his first meet.  He started telling him your dad or I need to work on your stroke.  I started laughing and explained some of the changes that have occurred in the 40 years since he swam.  The S pull he and I were taught are completely different from the stroke my son is being taught.  My point being with younger swimmers like Jr the kick is enormous.  When I was his age the kick (while important) wasn't as stressed as it is today.  So when you say things like you can't swim fast without a great kick I wouldn't agree a 100%. 

It's the number of kicks for a complete arm stroke cycle (one stroke by each arm).   

Mark. 

Just to be clear, in my previous posts, I never advocated swimming a full triathlon swim with a 6 kick beat kick; in triathlon it's employed more for tactical reasons. 

Separate studies by Watkins & Gordon and Hollander indicated that an average of 10-12% increase in propulsion from a six-beat kick, and that while good technique could increase that up that to 27%, poor technique could actually reduce total propulsion by 6%. 

 At the same time studies by Adrian, Singh, and Karpovitch have shown that kicking increases oxygen consumption by a factor of four over just pulling, so again, for middle and longer distances that indicates kicking should be use judiciously.

One other advantage of a six-beat kick, if properly timed, is that it helps to fill in the "dead spots" and resultant loss of velocity in the pull stroke. 

To your point about being "pragmatic", I mentioned previously that my best overall triathlon results have come in years when I focused on the bike.   Quite frankly, I'm doing more swimming these days (49K yds in January) than I probably should be to optimize my triathlon performance.  But I love swimming and see myself eventually morphing back to just swimming as running takes more of a toll on my 62 year old legs.         

Good discussion. 

Mark