Breast Stroke

Breast Stroke

If you ask people which swimming stroke they use, most will answer "Breast Stroke" and technically most would be wrong. Because true breast stroke has to obey strict rules if the swimmer is not to be disqualified in a race.

The main rule is deceptively simple. It requires that the stroke must be symmetrical about the centre-line of the body. It's difficult to achieve a legal breast kick and practically impossible without the supervision of a good swimming coach. For some swimmers this is a constant battle. Many if not most people swim "breaststroke" with some sort of illegal action, maybe a screw kick.

Other rules are that the head must face the front at all times, arms and legs must move symmetrically, the arms must remain in the water and a breath must be taken at each stroke except at the start and at turns.

These rules have been built up in time in response to attempts by competitive swimmers to gain an edge over their rivals. It is faster to swim under water and at one major event many years ago, judges were amazed to see the swimmers dive in and swim the whole 100 metre course under water. It was considered unhealthy by the authorities, so rules were formulated to outlaw this practice.

Then it was realised that arms could be lifted from the water without breaking the symmetrical rule. So the rules were changed to forbid it, but the new idea was the fore-runner to the modern "butterfly" stroke.

Arms
Starting with the arms extended to the front, hands together palms down. The pull starts with a downward movement and the hands separate but do not extend much further than the width of the body. The pull is not deep but stays just below the body line. It continues as far down as the hips, after which the hands are recovered naturally to the first position. The pull is quite narrow, unlike the wide sweep employed by most recreational swimmers.

As with other swimming strokes the hands are held with fingers slightly apart to increase their surface area.

Legs
Most of the propulsion in the breast stroke comes fom the feet and legs pushing back strongly against the water. Therefore it follows that the area of the feet and legs as viewed from behind the swimmer has to be as large as possible. Foot size and flexibility of ankles and knees all have a bearing on this.

Starting with the legs straight out behind, they are drawn up, knees slightly apart and pointing to the bottom of the pool. The feet and lower leg are everted, that is, turned out to present as large an area as possible for the backward thrust. The legs are thrust back powerfully, pushing the swimmer forward until the legs are fully extended, feet together, toes pointing back to minimise drag.

As with the arms, the leg movement is quite narrow and the swimmer should imagine swimming through a pipe. A wide stroke is not efficient and adds to drag.

It takes much practice to develop an efficient and legal leg kick. Any slight difference between the action of the legs will draw the attention of the style judge. Why? a scissor kick is faster. So if you're not interested in racing use a scissor kick.

Breathing
This is easy in the breaststroke. The head is held up slightly at all times, eyes looking ahead. At the start of the stroke the eyebrows will be at water level. As the arms press down at the start of the stroke, the head raises, allowing a lungful of air to be gulped in. Breathing out is done slowly through the nose and mouth for the rest of the stroke. Be sure to expel as much air as possible on each stroke.

Timing
This is difficult for the beginning breast-stroker. With arms and legs straight, the body lying prone, the first movement is with the arms. When the arms have pulled back to the hips the knees begin to bend. By the time the legs start their kick the arms are straight out in front reducing drag as much as possible.

Thus the timing of breaststroke is pull-push, pull-push. When the arms are pulling the legs are resting; when the legs are pushing the arms are resting. Split seconds in timing make a difference in speed and each swimmer tries to achieve the optimum. To help in this a skilled coach is necessary.

Exercises
Holding a board out in front practice the leg kick. One way of testing improvement is to count the number of legkicks to propel the swimmer for a length of the pool. Work to cut down the number of leg kicks. ask someone knowledgeable to check the legkick from time to time.