- Today, we are looking at stroke rate.
That is, how many stokes you take per minute.
You can also count that
by how many strokes you do per length
as that is a little bit easier to measure.
- Too low a stroke rate,
and you most likely have some dead spots in your timing,
and equally, too high a stroke rate
and that probably means that you're shortening your stroke,
and you need to think about lengthening it out.
- Well, in this video,
we are going to be looking at
the optimum stroke rate for triathletes.
We're going to be having a more detailed look
at Fraser and my stroke rate,
and then, helping you improve your own.
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- Stroke rate is important
because it effects the rhythm and timing of your stroke,
and it is directly related to the distance you take
per stroke in the water.
- So, if you have a stroke rate that's too low,
it suggests that you might well have a glide
or a pause between each stroke, and doing this,
you're going to be losing momentum in between.
You're basically gonna have to be
re-accelerating after each individual stroke.
- And too high a stroke rate indicates
you're probably losing momentum
and you're not getting good propulsion
from that catch and pull phase
that we're looking for at the beginning of the stroke.
- So, finding that optimum stroke rate is key,
and it's a basically a combination between your stroke rate
and your distance per stroke.
But it's worth bearing in mind, there is no golden number.
Every athlete is different.
It depends what speed and distance you're swimming,
and also what the water conditions are.
- Now, we are triathletes after all,
and that means the bulk of our swim training
is done in the swimming pool,
especially in those long winter months.
However, the key goal races that we have
are most likely gonna be in the open water environment.
- Yeah, now you might not find
swimming in a pool particularly easy,
but trust me, it is still much easier
than that race situation
which, like you said, is normally open water
and you're gonna be surrounded by lots of other swimmers.
- However, sea swims,
and in fact, any open water swim where the mass start
creates these really turbulent swim conditions,
and that's really not good when we've got
a slow, low stroke rate,
because it just means we lose our propulsion.
- Yeah, well obviously today,
we don't have that open water situation,
but we're gonna be getting in the pool
and comparing our stroke rates,
and then looking at how we can improve.
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So we're gonna swim 50 metres
that are perceived are my race pace effort
and count how many strokes it takes us.
- Goggles on!
- Here we go.
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- Heather's time for the 50 metres was 37 seconds,
and she took 37 strokes to complete that,
giving her a stroke rate of 60 strokes per minute.
Mine, however, was slightly higher
at 73 strokes per minute.
But research has shown that elite open water swimmers
do tend to have a higher stroke rate.
Now admittedly, we're not in a race environment right now,
but that being said, we would hope to see
a significantly higher stroke rate from Heather.
So now we need to have a look
at how we can improve her number.
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So we've got a selection of drills
that is gonna help Heather pick up that stroke rate.
- Yeah the first one, I'm gonna put some fins on
because that's gonna lift me
a little bit higher in the water
but most importantly, I'm gonna be travelling faster,
and therefore I have to move my arms naturally
that bit faster.
- And a second drill that we're gonna have a look at
is water polo drill
which means that you eliminate that glide
at the front of the stroke.
- Yeah, now this one,
I do still have a bit of a tendency to put that glide in,
but I think being able to actually see
where your hands are going in,
will help to increase your stroke rate.
- It makes you think about that as well.
- Yeah.
- And a final drill that we would think about doing is
surges off the wall where you really swim quite hard
and again that forces you to increase your stroke rate.
- So actually doing a faster stroke rate than normal
so when you do go back to swimming normally,
hopefully, you've got a naturally faster stroke rate
than you had before.
Well I've done the three drills,
so I'm interested to see
if it's actually gonna make any difference
when I swim my 50 metres.
So I'm gonna get back in, swim at the same pace,
and see if I get more strokes in the length.
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So it does seem that those drills have made a difference.
I managed 41 strokes for that 50 metres,
swimming at the same pace,
and yes it did feel like I was doing a higher stroke rate,
but with more practise, it will start to feel more natural.
If you are struggling to increase your stroke rate
and want to be aware of exactly what it is,
then you can actually use a tool called a tempo trainer
that simply sits on your goggles and it will beep at you
every time you want your hand to enter the water.
- And now as triathletes,
almost all of us are striving to have
an increased stroke rate,
'cause that's gonna give us that ability
to cope with those turbulent conditions
that you're most likely to encounter
when you're in the open water environment.
- Yeah and it's not something
you can simply just change overnight,
so go away, work on those drills
and let us know how you get on.
Hope you've enjoyed it,
hit the thumb up like button if you have,
and if you wanna make sure
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just hit the globe to subscribe,
and for a video looking at the difference
between pool stroke and open water stroke,
you can find that just here.
- And for a video about three drills
to help improve your front crawl,
then you can click here.