The two most impressive women in Bejing have been Coventry and
Adlington.

Let's talk Adlington vs Evans.

Adlington takes 41 strokes per 50 meters. Evans took 51. Adlington
has a great kick; Evans didn't.

The most prominent change with distance swimmers have been the way
that so many of the best distance swimmers have prominent kicks.
These swimmers have the long strokes. I did see a single swimmer in
the finals with a good old fashioned total lack of kicking (Sokolova)
and her stroke count was certainly well above 50 per 50 meters.

My challenge remains: show me a single swimmer at the Olympic level
who swims with a long stroke (relative to body lenght) who does not
also swim with a strong kick. There are still a few, diminishing
number of leg draggers, but they inevitably swim with short strokes
and high turnovers.

What is the relevance? Triathlon swimmers and fitness swimmers are
taught to emulate the Olympic level swimmers. So they are being
taught to swim with long strokes. But long strokes are efficient only
with strong kicks. Triathletes and fitness swimmers seldom have the
strong kick of an Adlington or a Larsen Jensen. So they are much
better off swimming like Olympic swimmers who don't kick, e.g.
Sokolova, who has virtually no kick and who has a high turnover, short
stroke.

By the way, Adlington is just TERRIFIC! She's a real jewel for the
Brits.

- Larry Weisenthal
Huntington Beach, CA

On 16 Aug,
"runnswim@aol.com (Larry Weisenthal)" <runnswim@aol.com> wrote:

> What is the relevance? Triathlon swimmers and fitness swimmers are
> taught to emulate the Olympic level swimmers. So they are being
> taught to swim with long strokes. But long strokes are efficient only
> with strong kicks. Triathletes and fitness swimmers seldom have the
> strong kick of an Adlington or a Larsen Jensen. So they are much
> better off swimming like Olympic swimmers who don't kick, e.g.
> Sokolova, who has virtually no kick and who has a high turnover, short
> stroke.

Teaching any swimmer to lengthen the stroke is well worth it. It means they
are getting a better grip on the water. I, alongside several other swimmers
from my (swimming) club am practicing for a mile open water swim where
wetsuits are allowed. The group training in a lake (with triathletes) noticed
that the better triathletes had a longer slower more relaxed stroke than we
had, despite one of our members having a tremendous kick. We are now trying
to emulate it.

>
> By the way, Adlington is just TERRIFIC! She's a real jewel for the
> Brits.

Yes, she's our first individual freestyle gold since 1908, our first
freestyle female gold, and our first female freestyle gold since 1912. The
last length of her 400 (and that of Joanne Jackson) was great, and her 800
was even better.

--
BD
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