Front crawl Breathing technique?
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Hi all,
I recently posted a message about doing breast stroke for my first attempt at the Tatton Triathlon sprint distance. With all your advice taken on board it still leaves me with the annoying, if not challenging front crawl!. I have had a few swimming lessons to try to master the stroke but i am still having problems with my breathing. when i started i could not even put together half a lenght of the local pool(25m pool). i can now do a full length with a true technique but find myself breathless at the end each length. I have tried breathing on every 2nd, 3rd and 4th stroke, all of which i feel fine with but i simply dont appear to be getting enough air into my lungs? Maybe it is due to a bit of anxiety? My swimming instructor seems to think that with practice it will all fall into place? Any help or advice would be much appreciated. Cheers.
I recently posted a message about doing breast stroke for my first attempt at the Tatton Triathlon sprint distance. With all your advice taken on board it still leaves me with the annoying, if not challenging front crawl!. I have had a few swimming lessons to try to master the stroke but i am still having problems with my breathing. when i started i could not even put together half a lenght of the local pool(25m pool). i can now do a full length with a true technique but find myself breathless at the end each length. I have tried breathing on every 2nd, 3rd and 4th stroke, all of which i feel fine with but i simply dont appear to be getting enough air into my lungs? Maybe it is due to a bit of anxiety? My swimming instructor seems to think that with practice it will all fall into place? Any help or advice would be much appreciated. Cheers.
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It's a common problem, I had it too (for the first few years of trying!). Overall, yeah it's down to practice, but the following will also help:
> Slow your stroke: crawl feels unnatural as we've our faces under water, so the natural thing to do is to speed up to get next breath/ end of pool, however this is counterproductive. If you slow your stroke down you don't need to breathe as hard, and it's easier to get a breath.
> Focus on rotation: good rotation makes it easier to breathe as you've longer to do it.
> Watch your flexibility: some difficulty in crawl breathing stems from expanding the lungs under stretch, ie because your arm is fully extended
> Practice catch up & glide: again part of slowing your stroke, but again slowing your stroke helps get the form right, then you can speed up.
Hope these help.
slow your stroke and breath every other stroke. I just breath to the right but on every right stroke.
minimise the use of your legs for now. Your legs use up something like 4 times more oxygen than your arms.
make sure your coach knows what they are doing.
practice at least three times per week. Aim to do say 50m continuous and build it up.
I hope this helps.
I will try slowing the whole stroke down and breath on every 2nd stoke and see how i get on.
I did my first open water swim last week and was told my technique was good so i am happy that my swimming instructor has done a good job so far. The open water swim did highlight that breast stroke was harder in a wetsuit. On the other hand crawl was easier so if i can sort my breathing out then i will be well and truely up for it next season!.
Get used to breathing bi-laterally, so every third stroke. If you have difficulty exhaling underwater, tow things can work. Firstly, try humming, mouth closed and hum through your nose. IF you constantly hum when your face is in the water then this will force you to exhale, and with mouth closed and through your nose as ling as your humming then no water can get in.
Second option is to talk. A common one is "bubble - bubble - breathe". if you do this in time with your stroke then it'll assist you in bilateral breathing. Once you get the hang of it then you can drop the talking, but I still do it every now and again as it helps me focus.
The idea is that because you are expelling 80%+ (estimate) of the air in your lungs when you turn your body (or neck if you are still learning) to breathe your body will just take a breath more naturally. And you'll not get into a panic and starting sucking down too much air. Or at the wrong time. You'll just get a rhythm. Breathe in out of water, breathe out under water, breathe in out of water, breathe out under water etc etc