Total Immersion

I recently bought the DVD, Freestyle: Made Easy,and the book, Triathlon Swimming Made Easy: The Total Immersion Way for Anyone to Master Open-Water Swimming.

The triathlon book is way better than the main Total Immersion book I first bought and the DVD is essential to understanding the drills, particuarly if you are a visual learner

Much of it is coming clear now.

Swimming is about technique, not conditioning. It's why people who can run marathons are exhausted after four laps in the pool, and while people who can swim a mile easily get winded trying to run for the first time.

To swim well you have to learn to swim like a fish to use your body rather than relying on your extremities. You have to create a long sleek submarine shape in almost under) the water and glide through the water with as little wake as possible.

If you can achieve the right form, you can swim almost any distance without tiring.



I'm hoping to get to the pool tonight after work. Here's what I'm working on as far as technique:

1. Putting head into the water so my body is more streamline.
2. My arms entering the water, closer to my head, and on an angle, so I am reaching through the water rather than over the water.
3. Almost always having one arm outstretched in front of my body giving me as long a shape as possible.
4. Rolling more as I swim, getting propulsion out of my body and not just my arms and legs.
5. Increasing my glide, staying relaxed and silent in the water.

Also, specifically for the triathlon:

1. Breathing/sighting on the left side as well as the right, which is my normal side.
2. Occasionaly sighting ahead where I lift my head slightly so just my eyes are above the water line so I can see where I am going without losing my stroke.

Finally,

1. I'd like to work on a flip turn so I feel I am more constantly swimming, rather than breaking every twenty yards.

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As a footnote to the above, here are two links that discuss the difference between total immersion swimming and traditional methods, between TI's fluidity and emphasis on reducing drag versus the traditional emphasis on strength and conditioning.

Wikipedia: Total Immersion

Total Immersion Startegies: A Closer Look

I suspect both articles were written by people favorable to the Total Immersion method.

From reading them you hear a strong arguement that the total immersion way is the best for the triathlete because it deemphasies leg and arm strength and requires less effort. If, as the author of Total Immersion has said in his discussions of triathlons that the swimming leg is the least important, it makes a great deal of sense to swim this way. He argues that since the swimming is the shortest leg of the triathlon (depending), the amount of time gained by swimming extra hard is not worth the time lost in the latter legs because you are exhausted. You should just get through the swim and conserve your energy for the bicycling and run.

In a sprint that is a 1/4 mile/12 mile/ 3.1 mile, with my estimated times that would work out to be 9 minutes/70 minutes/34 minutes, a sprint with a half mile swim would be 18 minutes/70 minutes/34 minutes. Not dissimilar ratios extend out for longer triathlons.