Feb 11
13
The right technique for your body
This is a subject that has occupied my mind a lot of late. Triathletes spend a LOT of time trying to analyse the techniques of the best, the equipment of the best, the training of the best. Why?
Its one of the things that sometimes bothers me most about some of the coaching faternity as well
Lets take the sport of running- we can play a beautiful video of Bekele, Gebrselassie, El Guerrouj, Kipketer,Dibaba,Radcliffe etc doing their thing. You’ll see massively long stride lengths and insanely quick stride rates, fantastic rebound off the ground, superhuman power coming from the spine and incredible timing and balance.
So lets just take the video of these people and overlay it on our happless age grouper – he needs more push off his toes, he needs to land further down his foot, he needs his hips higher, he needs more inclination forward, he needs more elasticity in his ankles- then he’ll run his next ironman just perfectly right? Wrong- whilst good running is good running Alex Age Grouper probably weighs 20kg more than the Kenyan pure runner and is carrying twice the upper body muscle. He’s also lucky if he is running at even half the speed. He sits at a desk all day and doesnt get a daily massage or a team of sports scientists looking after his body- which is often 20-30 years older. You don’t drive a F250 into a corner like a Porsche do you?
So why is it we see these books and videos describing drills and “the technique” that age groupers must emulate if they want the path to enlightenment?
I always find it puzzling when I hear a coach say “look at athlete x-(50kg girl wringing wet with no upper body)-now thats how you want to run (whilst talking to Tanky Ted who is 80kg and built like a brick shit house)”
Those two body types are going to balance on the ground completely differently for a starter. Even if Ted spent 10 years trying to run more on his toes his big arse calves and lack of flexibility from sitting at a desk all day is going to see minimal progress
Lets say instead we just tell him to run balanced and upright, use a comfortable length stride and just turn his legs over at a steady rate
I see plenty of Tank Teds eating up the field in Ironman. Many of the “beautiful” runners have shot their load by 20k and lack the strength to run with their “textbook” technique for 42.2. Our girl above gets off the bike smashed and cant deal with the fact she cant move gazelle like any more- she’s never practiced running with limited mobility- Tanky Ted blows by with his shuffle-5m/k=3.30 marathon =respectable by a lot of peoples standards
Would I be better spending time in building the muscular endurance of Ted with his steady technique or would I strip back some of his training to try and make him toe off more and be lighter off the ground? The answer is you would do both -but you wouldnt have Ted obsessing about this or convince him that his technique is “wrong”
Lets hop in the pool for a moment…..
The majority of triathletes get told they are
-Too stiff in the shoulders (duh- ever ride a bike for 12hrs a week Mr Swim coach?)
-Have their head held too high
-Don’t kick enough
-Need more glide per stroke
-Need a higher elbow
Now all of these things can be true …but I ask you is a guy who is 40 and spend a lifetime swinging shovels ever going to have the flexibility of a lifetime swimmer? Maybe
I think we all need to take a good look in the mirror………..(no not like that!)
If you see hard muscle , heavy set legs and something a bit stocky then you might have to adapt your technique a bit….sorry you ain’t ever going to swim with a technique that remotely resembles M.Thorpe,E.Sullivan or S.Rice
You are unlikely to have the flexibility ever to swim with the recovery phase of 12 year old full time swimmer-you’ll need to swing your arms a bit wider
You aren’t going to get nearly as early catch either- but you are stronger and you can turn them over faster
You might have to kick a bit harder than that skinny guy next to you in the lane to keep your body horizontal in the water
Your mate is built like a stick- no upper body to speak of, wonderfully flexible- He can probably do pretty well with a minimal kick for distance swimming, take much longer strokes and he’ll glide through the water like a spear, by further refining his beautiful catchHe can stroke even longer and slower- lucky guy- but also swimming to his body type. The coach of this guy cant see the point in paddle work- you dont need to be strong to swim well do you? No not in the case of the 12 year old with a tiny body mass to move through the water
I have seen those two guys at IM many times- and funny enough the stocky guy who trained true to his body type often smoked the stick insect….why? Despite the genius telling him he didnt need paddle work- when you put on heavy rubber around your shoulders and get in a open water race a few things happen- you cant alway swim with perfect glide- there’s a lot of stop start and smashing into people, the wetsuit neeeds strength to swim in well because it tugs on your shoulders, the guy built like a tank is smashing into you and smashing you out off draft of the pack
So our tanky guy could have spent his 20 week build trying to perfect drills of the textbook swimmer all the time or he could start the race trying for ‘perfect light feel for the water/light recovery etc etc. Instead against all advice he adapted to his body type- and smashed out some solid paddle and band work using his natural stroke- in fact plenty of it. Come race day he then smashed out exactly the same
My point is someone laboured but what I am trying to point out is thinking about the advice you are being given. Think about comparing yourself too much with others. We are all built differently. Yes there is always time/should always be time dedicated to technique -but dont dominate your training or let it be a reason for lack of confidence. You have to adapt to what you have to work with- choose the right technique for your body. The objective of changes in technique should always be the stopwatch. If you can reduce the time taken for the required distance then thats should be a positive sign
In the interview with Brett Sutton we summarised last week he spoke about many distance swimmers swimming with a choppy straight arm stroke, one side breathing, head a bit too high for a textbook- but setting world records. So if less than the “right” technique works for a world beater you can do pretty well for yourself with a technique that suits your body
Think about this when it comes to choosing your running shoes or setting up your TT bike- the textbook position or emulating the postion of CJ Macca or Chrissie Wellington wont always work. You can go damn fast with pretty ordinary technique too-despite what many $15 a session swim coaches will tell you- most well meaning-but sometimes like all professionals aimed at making you feel like you are missing the secret unless you keep coming back for the perfect technique!
Just food for thought-comments welcomed
