The Start
More often then not athletes find themselves in less the optimal positions during race starts. Starting at the right location can contribute greatly to your overall swim performance and swimming economy.
If you are a highly skilled swimmer, you would definitely like to start quickly by avoiding the situation of having to overtake countless other athletes and therefore position yourself at the start. However, doing so would mean that for at least the first 300-500meters you would most definitely need to into an anaerobic pace. Therefore when starting out in front, one must weigh the pros and cons of the choice carefully.
If you are a moderately skilled swimmer, economy would most probably be the name of your game. In this case, it would be most advisable to start at the opposite side start line measured by the first turn. This would allow the faster swimmers to pass while you take the slightly longer line. This strategy pays off as it allows you to swim at your own pace without being “drowned” by faster overtaking swimmers. Only as you negotiate the course do you continue to edge back into the “tiger-line” there by saving energy of having to overtake fellow triathletes of deviate because of fellow overtaking triathletes.
If you are a beginner open-water swimmer, the most efficient strategy would be to stay behind at the start line and let fellow triathletes get into the water first. More often then not many triathletes over pace themselves and end up getting to their lactate threshold (out of breadth), it is then when their pace drops rapidly. To be able to swim comfortably by eliminating the issue of having to worry about swimmers constantly overtaking you would definitely help calm nerves to allow for better focus on other issues such as stroke form and proper sighting. This way it would be most likely to extract an optimum performance from your stroke and fitness level.
Drafting
Drafting is a way many experienced open water swimmers use to save energy and maximize their swimming time. However, drafting is not without its respective weaknesses.
Strengths
- Significantly reduces frontal resistance
- Saving tiring movements of sighting by just following the foot of the swimmer in front
- Once the correct person to draft is chosen, there is lesser need to worry about pacing
Weaknesses
- Slow time if a triathlete chooses wrong(person swimming to slowly) to follow
- Triathlete may get mouthful of water if he or she follows too closely
- Swimmer may suffer from early burnout if the person he or she chooses to draft is too fast
Pre Transition Routine
After a extended period of time of having the body exerted in a prone position, there can be pooling of bloody in the upper regions of the body(hands, pactorals, lats, etc..) This pooling can cause drozyness, or heavy legs just at the time when the swimmer emerges from the water to run into the first transition point.
To eliviate such symptoms, some simple steps can be followed:
- 300m from shore, start a light but constant kick rhythm
- Every 10-20 flutter kick movements do one or 2 breast stroke kicks. This kick movement is very similar to cycling and hence can allow from the quadricept and hamstring muscles to “wake up”
- Wriggle your toes as you approach the shore
Approach
(Refers to the period just before reaching shore)
- Prior to approaching the shore, keep an eye on where are the positions fellow triathletes start standing up.
- More often then not it is more beneficial for triathletes to start walking or leaping even though their knees are below the water.
- Time the period in which you decide to stand up, the worse decision is to attempt to stand up and realize that you are still too deep in the water.