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Health knowledge made personal
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Health knowledge made personal
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Now that you have been instructed on how to use the arms we can get on with explaining the leg movements. Don't get discouraged here as it is one of the hardest parts in swimming to teach. When I was little I was always told "kick like a frog, kick like a frog". Hmm, it is really not quite so, but we can take a few pointers from the frog legs, so I guess the symbolology is ok. The issue with learning breastroke leg movement is that most people start with a scissor kick which is totally wrong.
 So, when you try these excercises, please make sure you are not kicking toward the bottom with one leg and toward the surface with the other. Instead of scissors, think of it more like tongs. Not crossing axis, but moving in the same horizontal axis toward each other.First, note that when you are gliding with your legs extended, your ankles should be touching and your legs together. This is how you start and finish the leg movement. Second, let's discuss what makes you go forward. The forward motion is caused by the inner shins of your calves and the inner ankles with the bottom of your soles. Third, how to move your legs. 1. When your arms are coming together with your elbows and your body is starting to lift out of the water for breath, this is the time to start moving your legs. Bend your knees and bring your heels straight back towards your butt. It is important that you don't bring your knees forward. Of course, there has to be forward motion with the knees a little, but it is very limited. This way you are not creating a resistance movement by going against the water forward if that is the way you want to go. The best way to practice this is to be on your back and when bringing your heels back to your butt, keep your knees underwater. Your knees are about a foot apart in this phase of the stroke. 2. The second phase is the kick itself. Kick outwards, however, not like you are kicking just outward (is this confusing?:). You need to create sort of an outward+ inward sweep with your legs below the knee where the inward kick is the movement that gives you the surge forward.  Remember what pushes you forward, the inner calves and inner ankles, so those are the ones that you need to be pushing the water with (viz the picture - don't laugh, I am no artist :)). In order for the innner ankles to be effective, your feet are turned out as the red circle shows you on the video which is at the end of this post. At the same time thrust forward and downward with your head at the same time, allowing your hips to rise to the surface. 3. To finish the kick and the final surge forward, you will use the sole of your feet. Imagine, you have fins (flippers) on and your legs are straight. The only part of your legs you can move are ankles. How do you make yourself go forard? You use your ankles to thrust your feet and the soles of your feet(fins) toward each other to create the forward motion. Now, let's see it in practice. The best way to learn :) The next video is an interesting example of a breastroke kick during a pull out. Remember that in pull out one is allowed to combine the breastroke kick with a dolphin kick. It does not look the cleanest with the upper body arching so much, but the kick is nice. Read more about the dolphin kick here. So, now you might wonder, why the separate articles on arms and legs. Well, research suggests that legs are much more important in generating powerful breastroke, so I figured, let's break those apart. However, note that in order to have an efficient, fast breastroke, one needs to find an equilibrium and sync in the arm and leg movements. So go on and try it out, first separate then together and play around with it. And remember "Breastroking is fun" :). |
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Posted by Libor