Engaging your brain whilst swimming

One of the things I love about swimming is the ‘brain re-set’. It’s allowing your mind to wonder and drift off. It’s very easily done and beneficial in lots of ways. BUT…you shouldn’t be doing this all of the time. If you enjoy a challenging sea swim, like the odd race, want to improve…go faster and further…then you need to learn to engage your brain whilst swimming. Particularly in a race scenario, there shouldn’t be any points where you stop thinking about what you’re doing.

My old swim coaching used to say ‘‘if you want to get good at fighting, get in a fight!’’. If you want to be a swimmer that can adapt to the conditions and swim to a race plan and/or adapt that race plan mid-race, you need to practice engaging with your brain in training. No good trying it in the middle of a race. You also need to be able to think clearly when you start to get tired…which takes practice.

During either a pool or open water swim there will and should be times where you adapt your stroke technique, stroke rate, kick rate, breathing, sighting (when and where you sight), head and leg position, draft someone… This all needs to be practiced fairly regularly.

Technique - if you swim in the open water, swim with hand paddles for swimrun/Otillo events etc you need to think about the chop. Swimming directly into decent sized chop can be tricky, as it can catch the back of your hands and disrupt your rhythm and stroke. You should practice swimming with straighter arms and giving your hands increased clearance of the water. This also goes for your breathing and which side to breath on. You always want the chop hitting the back of your head.

Kick - whilst your leg kick is far less important in the open water, it’s still useful. Putting in a little ‘kick’ at the end of a race or to stop someone drafting can be a very useful tool. Conserving your kick rate when you start to get tired can also conserve valuable oxygen. Getting your legs a little higher in the water and promoting a quick flutter kick when you’re swimming with the chop can also be a good tactic. These all require practice and they require some thought whilst you swim.

Breathing - reading the conditions and knowing whlich side to breath to, waiting to be at the peak of the swell rather than the trough before you breath can also be a great tactic…that needs thought.

The difference between an average and good performance and an average and good swimmers very often doesn’t come from all those muscles you’ve been training in the pool and gym!

The ability to look back and evaluate a swim and make adjustments before the next is also a key factor in improving performance.

Straight Line Swimming

The second some of us get out of the pool, into the open water and no longer have a thick black line to follow we struggle. There is a definite art to swimming ‘fairly’ straight. We’ll try our best in the following few points to get you on the right path.

• BREATHE BOTH WAYS. If you were to breathe to your left every time, when your head comes up to breathe you roll your body that extra few inches. This means that you extend your right arm forward that extra inch or two. If you’re right handed you’re extending your dominant hand forward an extra inch or two. Doesn’t sound like much but that extra inch or two over and over again starts to make a difference and you generally start to via to the right. It’s like rowing a boat with one oar that’s slightly longer than the other.

• SIGHTING : You’ve probably read a million and one articles about sighting. I won’t bore you further…other than to say, you don’t have to sight forward. I had a recent discussion with a swimmer about swimming into the sun. You can sight to the side, and use the beach or river bank provided it’s relatively straight. You can also use the depth your swimming in to a certain extent - provided you know the water and know the consistency of the bank / sea bed.

• RUDDER SWIMMING (AKA THE ‘HEAD RUDDER’). I tend to drift the opposite way to the way I breath. To counter this I breath every 2 for 3 cycles, then every 3 for 1 cycle and every 2 again for 3 cycles…and repeat. This keeps me straight. Experiment a little with your breathing and see if it has an influence.

• SIGHTING FREQUENCY. Everyone is different. Again, experiment a little and see what works for you.

• DRAFTING. Draft off of someone’s feet and you don’t have to sight. Just make sure they’re swimming in a straight line!

Best of luck.

Thinking about the Isles Of Scilly Otillo?

Team Sea Swim Cornwall (myself and business partner) competed in the Isles Of Scilly Otillo in 2017. A 40km run-swim-run-swim-run…event around 3 of the islands. Whilst Joe has competed in a number of distance, endurance events I come from a background of specialising in short distance pool swimming and waterpolo, so this was my first endurance event, at the ripe old age of 35.

We finished in 7th place in the mens category, which we were both very pleased with. Especially as there were times in the race I wasn’t sure if I’d finish at all. We really wanted cool, windy, choppy conditions during the event and got the flattest, calmest, hottest day we could have imagined. I don’t do heat!

Below I’ll list my observations from the race and hopefully some of you will find this info useful if you’re thinking of entering.

·             Racers & finishers. In this event you seemed to have pairs that went hard and really pushed for a great time. You also had teams that went to make the finish and enjoy the experience. If you fall into the ‘Finishers’ category just make sure you swim hard. Most of the people that drop out do so because of the cold.

·             Feed Stations. Learn the course. Running the back of St Martin was hell. I had moments where I overheated and started seeing black spots. So make sure you really fuel up at the appropriate feed stations.

·             Food. The Lemon Drizzle cake was awesome. Don’t miss out! At one point I ate some Liquorice and nearly spewed. Be carefully what you eat.

·             The Course. I spent a lot of time run training on shingle and sand in preparation for the race. If the course remains the same, there is very little shingle and sand! Mainly coastal paths. There are also some very steep inclines so train accordingly.

·             Tactics. Figure out your tactics and train accordingly. We never tethered and didn’t want to but I’m a swimmer and Joe is a runner. On reflection it could have been really useful. You can always take a tether and wrap it around your waste. I’d rather have it and not use it than the other way around.

·             Swim fins vs hand paddles. We went with fins thinking it would be choppy. It wasn’t. Could be an idea to take both and call it on the day.

·             Pacing. There will be moments where you’re close to death (very dramatic), learn to take it easy during these sections, maybe wait for the next feed station. Work as a team because at some point you’ll both struggle.

·             Googles. I bought a new pair of goggles for the event. Tried them out once in the pool beforehand. They didn’t fog for the entire race. I also took a spare pair and stuck them in the pocket of my wetsuit.

·             Wetsuit. We’re lucky enough to live near the Snugg Wetsuit shop and factory. I love Snugg wetsuits, always been a fan. The SwimRun suit they make is however, on another level! I rarely wear my long Snugg suit now as the SwimRun suit is so comfortable….it basically doesn’t feel like you’re wearing a wetsuit at all. If you don’t live in Cornwall they do have a measurement guide online and they often attend trade shows where you can get measured up.

·             Sprint Event. I never realised until the Sunday that there’s a 20km sprint event! For those of you not too keen on the 40 or so km on the Saturday.

·             Transitions. There are plenty of them. Make sure you know what you’re doing and you’ve spent time practising.

Any specific question feel free to get in touch.