- Morning Trainiacs.
We have what coach Jerry from Tower 26
would describe as a big training deposit today.
Big swim, little bit of a water run
because my feets are still kind of tender
from some of the running that I did on the weekend,
but other big things.
So after many years of having ROKA as my chosen wetsuit,
they were actually the first company
to ever take a chance on me, we have partnered up with them,
and we are running the biggest giveaway I've ever done.
So we're going to do this swim,
I'm going to do the water run,
we're going to save a bunch of time
because I want tell you about that giveaway.
And while we're at it, we're going to analyze Josh Amberger,
one of the best swimmers in triathlon, his swim stroke
because we've got some good swim footage from him.
Let's do it.
Lots of good things today, yeah.
(upbeat dance music)
(suspenseful music)
So for starters before we get into Josh Amberger
make sure you go to roka.com/taren,
biggest giveaway we have ever been a part of.
Over $2,000 in fabulous prizes from ROKA,
go sign up.
So Josh Amberger, obviously amazing swimmer,
coming out first of the water in Kona
a couple years running, and he's commonly pointed
to by Brent, the guy that runs Effortless Swimming.
I'll link to a couple of really good videos
that Brent had done on Effortless Swimming here on YouTube
on me, and he's helped me get mondo faster in the pool.
And he often points to Josh Amberger's stroke
as one that triathletes should emulate,
when they start trying to build an open water stroke.
So I started looking at Josh Amberger's stroke,
and I got mad respect for it for a few reasons.
Let's take a look.
So some things to know, about Josh Amberger's stroke here,
are that number one, he was a former competitive swimmer,
so he has flexibility and abilities in the pool
that we aren't going to have.
We can't emulate absolutely everything.
Also, take note that, he is only 5'7" tall,
which is really, really notable
because when you look at typically fast swimmers
and fast swimmers in triathlon,
a lot of them tend to be very long, that long lopey stroke,
and Josh doesn't necessarily have that.
So let's look at a few of those things with that in context.
So number one, first thing I want you to look at,
is his stroke rate.
I counted it up and did the math,
and this is just kind of a cruisey little pace for him,
and he is going 82 strokes a minute.
And why is this notable?
Well, most average age group swimmers
swim somewhere in between about 45 and 60 strokes a minute.
Most kind of starting to get to be competitive
age group swimmers swim around 70 to 75 strokes a minute
when we've got to hit it pretty hard.
But when you look at competitive pro-triathlete swimmers,
they're swimming at 80, 90, to 100 strokes a minute.
Why is this, and they're not doing
the long pausey just beautiful pool stroke?
Well, because in open-water, you have to be more forceful,
more aggressive with the stroke.
You've got to be able to punch through
the waves really forcefully.
You've got to potentially wack through people's arms
as they're around you.
You've got to keep your hand really firm
and forceful in the current.
And that long,
pausey glide
that a lot of swim coaches profess that you should be doing,
is actually decelerating you every time you have that glide
and that long low stroke count.
So we wanna work to get our stroke count up.
Josh Amberger, he's built it up to the point where,
at cruising pace, he's at 82 strokes a minute.
Next thing we want to look at actually is this right here.
Now, you can see that he's looking forward.
Why I want to point this out is
because I want to put it in context
of he was an elite swimmer before.
You saw that he looked up there at that one point,
but even though he's an elite swimmer,
he still, for the most part,
has his eyes almost perfectly downward.
Though he does look up occasionally as you saw,
but look at this, up and then for the most part down.
And why he's doing that is because
he needs to keep some critical aspects of swim technique,
basic swim technique in check.
One of those being when you are swimming,
you want the back of your head, butt cheeks,
heels at the surface of the water, and why you want that,
is so that as the forces of the water
are hitting your fingertips and coming back,
you see how that,
if you look at that, there is essentially no drag.
If you are, in another case,
looking up,
you're looking forward, what's going happen is,
if you aren't an elite swimmer, like Josh here,
your body and your head are like a see-saw,
so you look up, your legs are going to go down.
Not many of us have the ability to do both
look up and keep our legs up.
It's hard on our lower back,
and we just don't have the body tightness,
the core stability, to end up doing that.
So, even looking at Josh Amberger who is
former elite swimmer, he spends good chunks of time
looking at most,
not even 45 degrees out.
So in our case, we can certainly look basically
straight down when we're doing most of our pool training,
and then as we start getting closer to race season,
incorporating a little bit of sighting,
so we get the best of both worlds.
And the final thing that I want to show from this stroke
is a good example of how you don't need to stress out
about one of the sexiest terms out there
that a lot of swimmers talk about
and is looked at on Instagram pictures and videos,
like "Oh, that's what I need to do.",
is early vertical forearm, and, if you talk to
Jerry Rodriguez from Tower 26,
this is one of his biggest pet peeves.
But the idea is that a lot of swim coaches, say, alright,
you got to get your hand way out there,
pop your elbow up, and boom, put your hand down
as soon as you possibly can.
Meanwhile, us age group triathletes, you try doing that,
and then see how good it feels on your shoulder
when you put force on your hand the other way.
Doesn't feel very good.
In addition to that, look at Josh Amberger here,
he goes out, extends, forearm still isn't vertical,
forearm still isn't vertical.
It's not really until he gets to the point
that his hand is in line with the top of his head
that he starts really getting a vertical forearm.
But, he does, once he gets to that point,
keep his forearm vertical for as long as he can
basically pushing back, back, vertical, vertical
until he's just about six inches from the water,
and has to take his hand out.
So that's something that we can learn from.
Let me demonstrate.
So when you are swimming, you wanna keep
the fingertips lower than the wrist,
which is lower than the elbow,
which is lower than the shoulder,
and try to get your forearm vertical
at the point that your head is at,
and then pull back from your lats,
and then hold that vertical forearm.
Keep that palm pointed at the other end of the pool
pushing back for as long as you can,
and that's all you have to do.
You don't have to worry about this in, pop it up,
and push back, because frankly,
it just isn't going to happen for us Trainiacs.
Ain't going to happen for me, unless you are made of
the same stuff that Gumby is made of,
probably ain't going to happen for you.
So that's Josh Amberger's stroke.
I really like looking at that because as far as height,
as far as reach-wise, he's built like us.
He's built like a normal person,
and we can take some of the cues that he's got
and adapt that to our stroke.
Now make sure that you go to roka.com/taren,
even though they don't sponsor Josh Amberger
I just realized, but that doesn't mean
that he ain't a nice guy or a heck of a swimmer,
and it ain't a good giveaway.
It's a really good giveaway,
and you can go check out the Effortless Swimming videos
that we've done there and there.
Later Trainiacs.