It's a common question for many begginner triathletes when they start swimming. Heck, it's even a common question for advanced triathletes who have never been picked up on bad stroke habits...."What should i be concentrating on?" And it's often a very difficult question for a coach to answer, as often it is a number of things that is leaading to the incorrect stroke or technique that you may be doing. So here's some general tips that you should try to cover the next time you jump into the pool for a session...
1. Keep looking straight down when swimming freestyle. It’s important to keep your head down with only a small part of the back of your head out of the water. If you are trying to swim with your head up, you are just making more resistance for yourself, as there is more to pull through the water. You need to try to be as streamlined as possible. It is also important to try to not let your head move with the rest of your body as you rotate through the water.
2. In freestyle, your hands should pull all the way back past your hips. Try to concentrate on your hand flicking out of the water at the end of your pull.
3. try to minimize your kick as much as possible when training, as ideally you do not want to be kicking flat out during a race because you want to try to conserve energy for the bike and the run. People who kick alot are often trying to make up for a lack of balance in the water, so if you minimize your kick, it will help you to work on your balance weakness and improve core strength instead.
4. Don't feel the need to stay in a fast lane if you are struggling time after time to keep up with the group. It is a better idea to move to a slower lane and work on stroke technique rather than tyring to thrash it out with bad technique in an attempt to keep up with the main group. If you get your technique right first, then you can rejoin the fast lane and build strength to keep up with them.
5. Try to avoid letting your arm cut across your body. This is a common habit for many swimmers, and is basically seen when a single arm, or both, cuts across the midline of the body. This is often the cause for "fishtailing" or excessive movement of the body when swimming, and just causes a general inbalance in a stroke. Get a coach to watch you while you train and assess whether or not you cut across your midline so you can fix it if you do.
6. If swimming is your weakest leg, then you should make an effort to ttry to get into the pool as much as possible. This will mean that you maintain your "awareness" or "feel" for the water, and it will feel easier the next time you get into the water. Don't neglect it if it is your weakest leg. Even if it doesn't make you feel as good as other sessions, you must maintain regular swim sessions to try to improve your it.
BIKE
It's so annoying when you are riding along, minding your own business, and an angry car driver decides to blast you as they drive past. I mean, not only does it make you feel as if you may need an ambulance due to heart failure at the suprise of the blaring horn in your ear, it's also just damn inconsiderate. Right? Or where you doing something stupid to warrant that blaring horn? As both a car driver and a bike rider, i see it time and time again......stupid road decisions by a cyclist. You must remember that bikes need to be treated as vehicles by those who ride them. You must ALWAYS do the following when sharing the road with cars...
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Head checks before changing lanes…
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Signaling intentions to turn or change lanes…
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Awareness of road hazards…
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Knowing the controls…
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Control when passing others or being passed…
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Rules of the road in traffic
You cannot assume that you have ride of way because you are almost a pedestrian, because you ARE NOT ONE! Always obey the road rules as if you were a car, and remember that every time you go out there for a ride on the road that you are "playing" with a whole lot of heavy metal cars that go much faster than a cyclist does. So give them respect, and don't be one of those cocky riders who "owns" the road, because that is a sure way to disaaster.
Play it smart, follow the road rules, be a courteous road user, and if you do all these things and a car driver still blasts you as they drive past for no eveident reason, than you can always flip 'em the bird!
RUN
There are a lot of triathletes that have to own up to this fallacy....."you can only improve running through running." But lucky for you, this is not correct. Sure, an increase in running will improve your running fitness and times, but if you are doing extra sessions of running instead of a good core trength program, than you are wasting yout time.
Core strength during running is the crux of a good running technique and good times. Perfect running style due to good core strength means that you are more efficient and are wasting less energy. It is pointless to try and punch out the big k's every week if you are doing it with a poor style and little core stability, as you are just increasing your chances of getting injured, and "teaching" your body the wrong technique which makes it harder for you to work on correct technique.
Either involve yourself in a pilates class, or have your coach make a good core strength program for you, and include some long slow runs in your program where you do not work on speed at all, but instead concentrate entirely on keeping core stability and correct posture when running.
