THE VIDEOS!
BEFORE you watch the videos.. Take note:
To compare constant velocity of the body moving through the water, DO NOT look at anything else... JUST STARE at the hip and the nearest object next to it (i.e the lane rope, line on the floor or the deck floor)... Remember to offset the CAMERA's movement with the person's velocity. When the camera is moving together with the person in the frame in the same direction, the person will look always like he is in constant velocity.
For example, Scott Neyedli's SLOW SWIM at 2:25 - 2:45 which we will use for relative comparison here.. looks SMOOTHER than what it actually was. Compare the hip with the lane rope beside and you'll see that when he don't kick that much during that 2:25 2:45 period, his hips have a start stop or deceleration and acceleration phase as well just like Front Quadrant Swim (FQS).
KK SLOW SWIM - Note my cruise speed (80% 1500m) for 50m is about 52.5seconds so this is about 28seconds for 25m.. I've slowed down quite a lot and thus the hips are sinking a little cos I am trying very hard not to kick that much and reduced my arm pull to just forms and almost effortless push backs.. all just to save energy and do a relaxed continuous pull as suggested by Teck Beng... however.. from these 2 videos, I noticed that I do have start and stop instead of constant velocity! Read on to find out what I've discovered!
Scott Neyedli -- SLOW SWIM PART at 2:25 ~ 2:4
ALEXANDER POPOV (World Record Holder Olympian)
Shinji -- T.I at Perfection Nirvana-esque level.
After looking at my video of my slow swim until I cock eyed and then finally a moment of enlightenment struck.. I realized what went wrong. It was a case of thinking too much about one thing and forgotten where we came from.
We kind of forgotten about the benchmark of comparison - The Front Quadrant swim.
Most importantly, we kind of misinterpreted what is needed to be done for constant velocity to happen.
Allow me to explain.
First of all, notice that Alexander Popov and Scott Neyedli did their swim with STRONG kicks that are SUPERBLY CONTINUAL and with no pauses at all.
Constant velocity OF THE ENTIRE BODY in front crawl swimming is very tough to achieve. It requires the kick to be continually firing to compensate for the inevitable rise and fall of speed (or dead spot) in the arm stroke phases.
Yes.. I meant INEVITIBLE.
FOLLOW ME TIGHT AND CLOSELY THROUGH THE BELOW "ILLUSTRATION".
Arm stroke phases:
1) Out Sweep and Catch (No propulsion)
2) In Sweep and Push Back (Propulsion Starts, Optimum Velocity Achieved)
3) Exit and Recovery (No Propulsion)
4) Reach and Entry (No Propulsion)
In Front Quadrant swim:
After finishing the first pull to phase 3 (to make things easier to reference, we'll say we start with the RIGHT pull)...
The LEFT arm stays extended at the front without doing anything until the RIGHT arm recovers past the Forehead.
Once the RIGHT arm passes the forehead and reaches in front for Entry (phase 4), the LEFT arm starts the Out Sweep and Catch (phase 1) and upon the RIGHT arm's entry, the LEFT arm will do the In Sweep and Push back (phase 2) for it's optimum propulsion.
In Kayak Stroke:
After finishing the first pull, again RIGHT pull, the RIGHT arm will begin Recovery and Exit (Phase 3).
At this moment, there will be no waiting extension from the LEFT arm. The LEFT arm will start simultaneously the Out Sweep and Catch (phase 1).
Once the Right arm reaches and performs the entry (Phase 4), the LEFT arm is simultaneously doing the In Sweep and Push Back (Phase 2) to achieve optimum propulsion.
------------------ Are you lost? if yes, read from "ILLUSTRATION" again and then continue below for a Flow Chart ------------------
Clear?
Now we look at both stroking technique and we will notice from this following part of the cycle to be exactly the same:
Phase 3 (Exit and Recovery) --> Phase 4 (Reach and Entry) --> Phase 1 (Out Sweep and Catch)
There are NO propulsion coming from the arm AT ALL.
The only thing we can do here is to MAINTAIN OPTIMUM VELOCITY. KEYWORD is MAINTAIN.
There are TWO ways we CAN maintain velocity:
1) ALWAYS travel at the constant velocity.
2) REDUCE number of pauses and also the durations of each pause.
BUT EXACTLY... HOWWWWWW??????
There are TWO things we CAN DO to achieve that:
1) To add a continuous and strong kick that will keep pushing us forward REGARDLESS OF WHAT OUR ARMS ARE DOING.
2) Don't glide. I.E don't do front quadrant swim (FQS).
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Before we carry on, let's break the swim down into diagrams and you'll see it much clearly in the phases.
KAYAK SWIM STROKE CHART and FQS SWIM STROKE CHART
If you go up and look at Shinji's stroke and compare it with the diagram of FQS SWIM chart above, you'll notice that there is a phase (in RED) that is two stages of non propulsion which causes the propulsion phase (phase 2 of In Sweep and Push Back) to kick in one stage later than the KAYAK SWIM STROKE. That causes an EXTRA DECELERATION as compared to the continuous KAYAK SWIM STROKE whereby there is no prolonged pause of stage 4 which is the arm extension of the non pulling arm while waiting for recovery hand to pass the forehead.
As for the continuous KAYAK SWIM STROKE, there is only one stage of Deceleration.
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With that, we conclude that the KAYAK SWIM STROKE achieved Objective number 2 on maintaining Velocity mentioned above on reducing number of pauses. While FQS SWIM STROKE totally denied Objective number 2 by increasing the duration of the pause and even dragging the pause to the next phase (thus increasing the number of pauses).
The duration of the pause, i.e the Speed of the arm doing the recovery will then be the determining factor for KAYAK SWIM STROKE when deciding to go faster or slower.
The above points now clearly dictate that Kayak Stroke is the more efficient stroke of the two.
However, it is important to note that both strokes CAN be fast. And CONSTANT VELOCITY IS ACHIEVABLE with BOTH STROKE TYPES.
The trick as stated above, other than not choosing FQS, is to compensate with a continuous and strong kick which will continually propel you forward regardless of what the arms are doing. The strong kick will thus eliminate the deceleration phase(s) of each stroke. Of course, the kick has to be much stronger in the FQS SWIM STROKE because of the extra deceleration phase.
I hope this article clarify ALL details on the stroke cycle efficiency of KAYAK swim stroke versus FQS other than knowing exactly when to relax and when to contract while performing the stroke itself which is ABSOLUTELY vital in getting the KAYAK swim stroke to work at a slow swim state. Without knowing when to relax, your KAYAK swim stroke will feel like thrashing water and breathlessness will haunt you throughout your whole swim. I hope Teck Beng can help explain upon that if you have the time as I've passed to you and Calvin all that I could explain on that day and I hope you guys did absorb on the exertion part too and now it's your time to give~ hehehee..
Cheers
KK
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