7 Rules From 10 Years Coaching Pro Triathletes.

In this video, I'm going to share with you seven rules I've learned from coaching pro triathletes over the last 10 years. And if you're an age grouper, wanting to make your way further up the field and come out of the water quicker, with more energy, in this video, I'm going to share with you the things that I've learned from working with some of the best in the world, including a little bit of work with Kat Matthews, who is the two-time Ironman Pro Series winner. Rule number one is rotate enough to easily recover your arm over the water, Now, your recovery is when your arm comes over the top of the water, and you'll see this will vary greatly depending on the different athlete. And rule number one is we need to rotate our shoulders enough so that we can comfortably recover the arm over the top, because it's called recovery because we should be somewhat relaxed as we bring it through. We don't want to be stiff and tense and use a lot of effort there. But the first thing is you need to be able to rotate enough so that you can do that, because our shoulder doesn't work very well if we're too flat, it's hard to get that arm through. And you'll see a difference between the different swimmers in, some will be a little bit higher with their arm and their elbow, some will be a bit straighter, some will be completely straight. Everyone does it differently depending on the style of their stroke, their mobility, the type of swimmer that they are. So it doesn't matter too much what happens over the top of the water, unless it impacts what happens under the water in a negative way. And how that can happen is if you recover too flat and wide, if you're too flat with your shoulder, or if you're doing something like a really high elbow recovery where your hand comes too close to the body and you end up jamming up your shoulder. So that recovery doesn't matter a whole lot unless it's impacting you in a negative way. But don't feel like you need to have this perfect pool swimming recovery, especially as a triathlete, especially in a wetsuit, which might restrict some of your ability to move. So go with what suits best, as long as it's not throwing the underwater part of your stroke off. Rule number two, your legs are not going to provide much propulsion, but you can kick more than you think. So with your legs at the back, they're going to provide a small amount of propulsion, but they do have an important role in the stroke. And that important role is it provides a counterbalance to your arms and your rotation. So at the back, what it's doing is helping stabilize you. So you feel like you've got something to press against as you're going through your catch and your pool, and it helps you rotate back to the other side. So even though it's not providing much propulsion, it's important to have an effective kick. And we obviously don't want to use a lot of effort with our kick when we're swimming, because you've got a bike, you've got the run to come. But the thing is, you can still have a four beat or a six beat kick, which is a continuous kick. You can still have that while kicking very lightly, because we just want to make sure we're not putting a lot of effort into the kick. And your kick will probably chop and change depending on whether you're siding or the side that you're breathing, the effort that you're going or the part of the race you're in. So your kick might go from a four beat kick to a six beat within the race. It might chop and change depending on those things. But the main thing is your kick remains light. And you will see in pro triathlon, that whether it's an Olympic distance, you'll see those swimmers kicking likely a six beat kicking quite hard or quite consistently, but the effort won't be super high because that is going to be one of the first things to raise your heart rate and the first things to tire you out. So let your legs kind of do their thing as long as the effort isn't high. Rule number three, your catch is important, but the muscles that you use through the catch and pull are more important. And what do I mean by that? Well, your catch is this first part of the stroke where we set ourselves up to get our hand and forearm facing backwards. So we've got this big armful of water that we can then accelerate and press back past the hip. And that's gonna be one of the main things that's moving you forwards. And that catch position that we want is this high elbow catch, where we've got the elbow bent, the fingers pointing down, that's an important position. But it's not that effective if you're using the wrong muscles through the catch and the pull. And one of the main muscles that we're going to use through this part, particularly as we're going through here, as the hand comes under the shoulder and down towards the navel, the main muscle we're gonna use through there is our lat, if we do it well. And one of the biggest realizations I've had over the last six months, since I ran a camp with Sharon Van Rivendell, who won the Olympic gold in Paris for the 10K, is that a lot of people don't use their lats very well when they swim. And so if we can get to using them, and obviously our lats are underneath here, if we can get to using those, then yes, our catch is important, but we don't need to be in any crazy positions with an extreme high elbow. You can be in a decent position, but if you're using your lats mostly through this middle phase of your stroke, you're probably going to be holding good water and you're going to be connected very well with the rest of the body. And that means that you can hold a relatively quick stroke rate and you can be holding that fast pace without much effort. So then the question is, well, all right, how do I actually use my lats through the stroke? Well, this is the thing that takes time, and I've done quite a bit of work with this with a lot of our swimmers that we coach online through our coaching membership. Now, one of the things there is that in the catch, this is where we need to let the shoulder slide up near the side of the face. And we need to just allow that shoulder to move so the shoulder blades will sort of slide up along the rib cage to set up a good catch. But from here, as we go through this part of the stroke, that is where we need to get the scapula, the shoulder blade coming back and down through here so that we can use the lats. And then the last part is going to be more about the triceps. And there's a number of different ways you can go about it. We've got a TheraBand or an exercise band routine that we do prior to swimming. There's a number of drills that you can do like our YMCA drill that you can focus on having the shoulders in the right position. But I've seen a huge change personally for me in my stroke and the speed I can hold and swimming at less effort for holding those faster times because I've been able to use my lats because there's some of these things I learned from Chamb and Rivendell. So your lats are very important and almost more important than your catch position. Rule number four, your stroke rate is important, but do it the right way. Now, part of your speed, the speed equation is how far you travel with each stroke and the rate at which you take those strokes. Now, typically we want to work on a longer stroke firstly, so increasing our distance per stroke, and that comes by reducing drag, so good body position. And secondly, it comes from an effective catch and pull through, so you get good propulsion and you time that correctly. So we work on that first. But the next piece is, well, you're going to have to increase the stroke rate or your cadence in order to get faster. And so the way that we can do that, firstly, you will go through your catch and pull with a bit more speed, and you will put a bit more power into it. That's certainly one aspect, and you'll accelerate through. But another part of increasing your cadence is going to be the recovery over the top. If you are relaxed and quite cruising over the top in terms of just not being forced or tense, you can recover quite quickly for very little effort. And then you can get over the top of the water fast, and that's a big factor in increasing your stroke rate, is that faster, very relaxed recovery over the top of the water. So there's a number of different areas where you will increase the speed of it, and the catch and pull is one, but we don't want to be too fast with that part. We also need to make sure we get over the top of the water quickly too. And we do that by being somewhat relaxed and making sure that we sort of swing that arm forwards in front, because you're going to carry that momentum over the top of the water, and then throw it forwards out in front, and that's going to help you with the other arm at the back as well. So increase your cadence, but do it the right way. Lesson number five is learn to swim hard and hold it for a long time. Now I know this channel is called Effortless Swimming. I've run Effortless Swimming for almost 19 years now. The way to get effortless is to put in the effort first. So obviously technique's a big factor there, and having the right technique will allow you to swim very comfortably at a decent pace. But you still, if you want to compete at the top end of the field, you're going to have to put the work in. And one of the types of sessions that I've seen work very, very well for athletes who really want to be competitive are best average sessions, where we do this every Friday, where we'll do hundreds off of two minutes, and I'll aim to come in under 110. So we're going hundreds where you're trying to hold as fast as you can for all of the hundreds within that main set, and you're trying to be consistent across all of them. And what we worked up towards in the lead up to our main events was 21 hundreds, best average, off two minutes. And best average just means you hold, you're trying to average as fast as you can across all of them. So let's say that might be, say 120 for all the hundreds, trying to be consistent. Now, that is a very hard set to do, and I wouldn't start with 21 hundreds, best average, but in that set you've got quite a bit of rest, and what you're trying to work on is getting comfortable, being uncomfortable, and just holding as hard as you can through that whole set. And it's not easy to do, but if you can learn how to swim hard and just be somewhat comfortable within that sort of intensity, that is going to help you so much when it comes to your racing, especially for those shorter distance races where it might be an Olympic distance, maybe a half Ironman or anything shorter than that. You need to learn how to swim hard if you want to be very competitive. And that will make these faster times actually easier to hold. Now, I wouldn't start with 21 hundreds with a lot of athletes that we coach through our coaching membership. We have them start with just 10, one hundreds best average. And depending on what pace you're doing, you might leave on two minutes 30 or three minutes. So I like to leave on two minutes and I try and hold under one minute 10 in a long course pool. So that's about 50 seconds rest, which is a lot, but I find it's a great way or a great set to get that intensity so that you can hold a fast pace over your races. Rule number six, your hips are the engine room. Now, when you are swimming freestyle, you're going to be rotating a similar amount through your hips and through your shoulders. But I like to think of the hips as the engine room, meaning that that is where your rotation will begin. So you think of your hips as the engine room where they're just rocking side to side and that's helping then rotate your torso and your shoulders. So the hips are where we control it from. And you don't need to rotate a lot through your hips, 30 to 40 degrees at a maximum usually, but that is where we initiate the rotation. And if you think of having this as the engine room, then everything else seems to flow from there. Because the way that I got taught swimming is you want to swim from the inside out, meaning that your hips and your core, that is where everything starts from. And then we go out from there through the shoulders, the elbow, the wrist and the hand. We've got to start from the inside out. And to me, the hips and the core, that is where it all initiates from. Rule number seven is breathe as often as required. You'll see videos, you'll hear people talk about breathing every three and making sure that you bilaterally breathe. Now the thing with that is it's great to be able to breathe both sides. And I would highly recommend it within your training for 30 to 40% of your session. But when it comes to swimming fast, breathe as often as required. Because number one, you've got to get enough oxygen in, you've got to get enough air in to be able to meet the demands that your body is asking of you. And that might be breathing every two strokes. And I've interviewed a lot of great swimmers and great triathletes on this channel. And they've all said that when it comes to going fast in training, and especially in a race, they will breathe as often as they need. For example, Sam Short breathes to the one side when he's racing. And so when he's going hard in training and when racing, he just sticks to that one side. But if he's doing easier stuff in training, he will make sure he breathes to both sides. He'll go one lap down on the left, one lap down on the right. And so that is a good approach for training. But don't restrict how often you breathe because you have heard it's better to breathe every three strokes or four strokes. That might need to be every two, especially if you are going fast and you are looking to be at the pointy end of the field. But if that is every three and that's comfortable, stick with that. But everyone's different, but you do not need to limit yourself to breathing every three or four. Now, bonus rule number eight here is you don't have to be the fastest swimmer in open water. If you have very good skills, you can swim with people who are quite a few seconds faster than you per hundred, and you can still match it with them. And the reason for that is open water is a different beast than in the pool. Because we can draft and how straight you swim can play a big part of that as well. And I've seen so many swimmers get beaten who are faster in the pool, but they get beaten by people who are slower in the pool because they have much better open water skills. Now, some of that is drafting. So you can sit behind someone and save 20, 25% of your energy by sitting directly behind them or sitting next to their hip. You can save so much energy and swim a lot quicker by drafting well. So that is a skill that's worth investing in. Siding as well. So if you can sight without lifting your head up too high and having your hips drop, then you can also save a lot of time there by sighting effectively. Plus, if you can make sure that you swim a fairly straight course, you might cut off 50 or a hundred, even sometimes 200 meters on an Ironman swim by just swimming more directly. And that can be a big time saving as well. So the thing I love about open water swimming is that you don't have to be the fastest swimmer. If you've got good strategy and good skills, you can really be competitive and sometimes beat those faster swimmers. And so that is one of the best things about triathlon or open water swimming. So if you can learn to use those skills to your advantage, then you can really find your way towards that front pack. If you're working on your freestyle technique, but you're not sure where to start, click the link below, which will send you to our freestyle technique checklist, which will have the order of things to work on your stroke in. So that'll tell you exactly where to begin if you're not sure.