Quote Originally Posted by badger View Post
Miranda: I find swimming to be an endlessly refining sport. There's always something you can tweak to make things work better.

As for breathing, that will take time and just keep practising. One thing you might want to try is, outside the water, stand with your hands up. Put them together and have them tuck around your ears. You want to tuck your chin in, and imagine a string coming out the top of your head pulling you. If you don't tuck your chin, your face isn't streamlined with the body and you end up getting more of a drag.

And when breathing, you don't have to move your head/face, just imagine you're a log and roll. Lengthen your arm and just roll over half way to get a breath. Freestyle and backstroke is a lot about roll, but your head shouldn't move. One good drill to do to get used to the roll is doing 3 strokes free, 4 strokes back. So, as you finish your third free stroke, roll onto your back, and after your 4th back stroke, roll onto your front. You can do that 2 and 2 as well. It might be dizzying at first, though!

And for backstroke, be sure to tilt your head back slightly, that will bring your butt and legs up. My favourite stroke is backstroke, too, it's so natural for me and I can keep up with everyone else's freestyle. My coach even said I should do the tri doing backstroke! (a joke, of course, but one I contemplated!)
Thanks, badger... that was great advice! The specifics really help. I need that.

When I backstroked today, I made a point to tilt my head back. It did indeed help straighten me out.

I chickened out on freestyle today. I did not realize about the rolling. That would be so much better for me overall.

I have degenerative disk disease in my back and neck. That's one reason the docs like the swimming (non impactive stress on the disks). But, I could never figure out how to not crank my head to breath and irritate my disk that's a problem in the cervical spine.

Now, I know better.

Btw, that is a really good drill about switching up strokes... hopefully even being humble I can sort it out.