Nightcrawler's Journey to European Masters Swimming Championships (Slovenia)

If you going to do hand dragging then I prefer finger tip dragging as per T.I. I like that one.

The best Doggy Paddle is supposed to be Long Arm D.P or Long Dog.

SA wrote:
You can progress in 3 stages to more loading of the catch.
1 normal doggypaddle, all bodyparts underwater. No above water weight to handle.
2 Nightcrawler hand drag drill. Almost normal stroke, but not as tiring to lift the arm up and over.
3 taormina over the water recovery drill. more lifting and stretching involved. Most loading of the catch. most core action needed to keep straight during thransfer of forces between high and low side.

Exactly, I am also doing all 3 varieties in one set under the name of doggy paddle drill (you may call nightcrawler hand drag or modified doggy paddle drill).

between dog paddle and over the water dril, I think dragging the hand focusses most on the deep foundation of the stroke with minimal distraction of arm action and focus on balance , roll and extension.
Dog paddle lets you bend the arms in awkward angles to get a good grip on the water, over the water recovery makes you do a lot of lifting and upperbody stretching, combined with rolling balance.
The hand drag stroke can be a pretty relaxed style compared to these other 2.
NIghtcrawler shares more with some  TI principals than he likes to admit
Yeaah, they are just general swim principals, no patent of TI!!!

For ultimate speed. swimming with the over the water recovery loading style nonstop is the only way.
At faster rates there is no time to only use bodyweight, wait till eternity untill body sinks and pull after that.
Thats only for drilling. Its big strokes and a lot of that core pulling every stroke at higher rates. very exhausting. only loping is slow strokerate enough to keep using it.
Swimming is called a sport.

24.08.2017 - Morning Session 6:30-7:30 - LCM 4000m

100m easy

Set1: 1500m crawl with paddles (20:37, pace:1:22)

100 easy

Set2: 1500m crawl hand drag drill (23:21, pace:1:32)

100m easy

Set3: 10*50m crawl R:5" (7:14)

200 easy


Notes:

Today I swam with drag suit again and also again in LCM. With in a week I got used to swim in LCM and has already transferred my (EX/OLD   )SCM paces to LCM.

Yesterday afternoon I went to the pool for a recovery swim and to see my friends, we all together swam 10x100 in 1:40 in SCM. They were surprised when they saw me swimming with 1:15 pace in the SCM, I was also surprised; then at the end of the small afternoon session I couldnt keep my self and did a 400m time trial from water start in SCM (4:57 - very close to Turkish 40-44 age group masters record which is 4:52)   . As I had written yersterday everything would be better from now on...

*** IMPORTANT: My improvement is not only because of my better endurance it is also thanks to the change that unconsciously(thanks to the power gained - as I wrote before the power rules the technique)  I did in my stroke mechanics, I will share a video soon.
A sound endurance and power always creates difference, please note this.

25.08.2017 - Morning Session 6:30-7:30 - LCM 4000m

100m easy

Set1: 1500m crawl with paddles (20:20, pace:1:21, TT:41")

100 easy

Set2: 1500m crawl hand drag drill (23:02, pace:1:32, TT:46")

100m easy

Set3: 500m crawl - moderate pace (7:00, pace:1:24, TT:42")

200 easy


Notes:

Today morning due to sleepiness I forgot my wrist watch (chrono) at home. I used tempo trainer(TT) as an alternative in order to catch up with a proper pace. During 1500m free with paddles I set the TT to 41 seconds which stands for 1:22 pace per 100m. As a result, I completed the 1500m free with almost 10 seconds ahead of TT.

It is getting easier day by day to hold the paces around 1:20 in LCM (50m) pool. I guess that holding a pace around 1:18/100m in LCM wont be a dream in this winter season.

We escaped from İstanbul to Antalya for 15 days holiday

Of course i will continue my workouts here, no days off!

Some videos of my new technique, which has 1:18 pace:
https://youtu.be/ErEIlU-oxnY
https://youtu.be/fqbSAWJnUzQ
https://youtu.be/AseQ0DXVFFk

I think my dear friend Mr. Cottmiler will like it

We would love to be there of course.

This long weekend we have only a small indoor hotel pool to play in but are able to practise finger tip drag and other useful drills.

Hope one day we may come together and swim... Ifwe move to Antalya you will be my guest, with pleasure.

Due to indefinite economical situation of the country noone want to invest on real estate, so we still couldnt have sold our flat Istanbul for relocating to Antalya, still waiting for a customer. Until it is sold we decided to visit Antalya every month at the weekends in order to have a better pshychology. Mrs Nightcrawler resigned from work, she has been swimming with me since then everyday, she is getting better day by day.

nightcrawler wrote:We escaped from İstanbul to Antalya for 15 days holiday

Of course i will continue my workouts here, no days off!

Some videos of my new technique, which has 1:18 pace:
https://youtu.be/ErEIlU-oxnY
https://youtu.be/fqbSAWJnUzQ
https://youtu.be/AseQ0DXVFFk

I think my dear friend Mr. Cottmiler will like it

What do you think about my new recovery technique?

I am not qualified to comment but although the recovery looks good, it is what happens under water that really matters.

It is a pity you burnt your boats with Paul Newsome and SwimSmooth. You would do better with a franchise and SS is worldwide and growing.

Mrs NC could have the job videoing open water swimmers, especially under water, for you to help the students.

Hi Mr. Cottmiler
I dont want to talk badly more about SS and Paul because he is your feiend and you are my friend too, so that it may hurt you if i say smthng bad about him. I respect him because he is getting into the water and showing smthing useful when compared with outside-water coaches, it is a great jib, well done to him. On the oher hand, he(he is not a bad guy in my opinion, but we are not walking the same line) misunderstood me and gave a fever reaction without understanding what i have been talking about in real, it might be due to his not being open to criticism. All in all, i can say that i m doing local orgqnisations for serving people who want to improve their swimming paces, actually i dont want to be a part of a big trade like SS, because swimming is not a trade and i dont want to abandon this philosophy and amateur sports soul. Hope i could express my feelings with my poor English that i could only had chance to learn at the school without any native speakers' practice. When Mike invited me to this new forum i am impressed, it meaned that i there were people who could understand and cared me. Wasnt it fine?
I love you all
Regards, Emrah.

My new arm recovery technique which speed ups 4 secs per 100m:
https://youtu.be/UdZ8uv4fZ4o
https://youtu.be/YmHuQtA1vSM
Lean your shoulder to the wall and circle your arm by the help of hip rotation, this will allow you to circle the arm inside your body's siluette and the higher arm rushing through the water will help to beat the frontal drag and provides better and quicker catch. Made 4 secs per 100m pace difference on me.

My new technique is very similar to Anna Karin's:
https://youtu.be/4LDbps7O5Ps

Waiting for your comments.

cottmiler wrote:I am not qualified to comment but although the recovery looks good, it is what happens under water that really matters.

It is a pity you burnt your boats with Paul Newsome and SwimSmooth.  You would do better with a franchise and SS is worldwide and growing.

Mrs NC could have the job videoing open water swimmers, especially under water,  for you to help the students.

Regardless of how it goes down life goes on!

26-27-28.08.2017
I did open water workouts in Mediterranean sea:
6000m avg pace: 1:22
5000m avg pace: 1:20
7000m avg pace: 1:23

29.08.2017-OW workout (4500m)
Freestyle with paddles:
2000m R:1'
1500m R:1'
1000m R:1'
all at race pace

Swimming upstream at Perili Bay Resort(Haunted Mansion Beach), Marmaris, Datça
https://youtu.be/Y0yjmlqh9dE

only watched your first clip and its looking great.
this is a very interesting progression Nightcrawler. I always disliked your transition from extension to pull.
too much Ti like with little full body connection to the pull.
Straight arm forces you to connect the arm to body better from start to finish. Trying to track straight in the process.
If you can throw the arm into a streamlined spearing shape underwater and follow through with a smooth buildup of pressure  you have made a big step in this part of the stroke. building from this you can nake the movement even more efficient by adding more articulation of the arm which is the high elbow, but thats only optimal if it builds on the underlying foundation you are working on right now.
I like to exagerate the whole arm movement keeping everyting below the waist as streamlined as ¨possible, but twist and reach from the waist up driving the static held big paddles  as much as possible from the trunk to feel what is possible.
After that remember some of this internal action while making the body more straight like a pencil again to find an optimum between propulsion and drag.
Dont know how sustainable this style is , but maybe you can sustain it with better endurance after your extensive training.

I like the straight arm recovery and NC's new technique too. It's worth noting that there are different versions of straight arm recovery: it can be high above the water (eg Scott Tucker, F. Manaudou), low swinging to the side (eg Shelley Taylor Smith), in-between solutions (eg Shelly Ripple - see Richard Quick's videos - Federica Pellegrini) and hybrid solutions (eg Harry Wiltshire: high above the water on breathing side, low swinging to the side with the other arm). I think NC falls in the first category (Tucker) when he turns to breathe and in the 3rd category (Ripple) when he doesn't breathe.

Now, what's best? Of course it depends on the individual. Generally speaking, a high (almost) vertical straight arm is a great balancing tool (it presses the chest by design) and delivers all the energy forward, theoretically the best option. But it also requires a high amount or rotation and more work than swinging to the side. That's why it's commonly seen among sprinters imho. On the opposite side of the spectrum we have the low straight arm swinging to the side, very comfortable but less powerful, less of a balancing tool and it could also deliver part of the energy sideways when not mastered. However it's very comfortable (especially on NON breathing side), does not require much body rotation and many distance swimmers choose this one, especially when tired. Harry Wiltshire is smart in that he swings high only on breathing side, where the high vertical arm is more sustainable (and he breathes every 2, so he's got a golden stroke out of 2).
I noticed a lot of high vertical straight arms on the front pack of NC's race right after the start (perhaps he took inspiration from that race?), I'm not sure whether those leading swimmers were more Tucker style or Wiltshire style though.
On 10k races I usually see low straight arm swinging to the side or bent arms.
What do you guys think about it?

Finally, what I see in NC's latest videos is a higher stroke rate and a great balancing tool (the high straight arm). That's what makes him faster imho. The underwater part of the stroke seems the same to my eyes. But I don't have SA keen eye and swimming is a sport where some subtle changes are hard to be seen from the outside and easy to be felt from the inside.

Salvo

Thanks for your comments, i just gazed at the forum, on a holiday now, will read detailly later on, here are some videos from today's session (7km) in rough water.

Briefly, my new technique(which i learned in Budapest World Masters Championships a month ago from Italian swimmers) is very very efficient in rough seas, you will see this obviously in the below videos (wind is almost 50 knot)  

https://youtu.be/shbK62Aj7DA
https://youtu.be/7VdcIGYwJOE

Yes, on seas like that, choosing the high-swinging recovery is a no-brainer! Otherwise you can find the waves killing your rhythm by forcing an unwelcome hand-entry before the hand has even passed the shoulder!

Another adaptation I find useful for choppy seas is a slightly wider pull (if the waves are transverse) - it gives more stability, preventing over-rotation. I think of the pulling arm as being like an outrigger on a canoe.

Holiday is over, we have been around Mediterranean since 26.08.2017, everyting was excellent during the holiday. Swam everyday more than 5k in the sea, sonetimes came across with big sea turtles:).

Yesterday we returned to Istanbul, time to get ready for the new season, today's session:


11.09.2017 - Afternoon Session - LCM 4000m

100m easy

Set1: 1500m crawl with paddles (20:40, pace:1:23)

100 easy

Set2: 1500m crawl hand drag drill (23:34, pace:1:34)

100m easy

Set3: 10x50m crawl R:5" - 400m race pace (recoveries included total time: 7:22)

200 easy

Note: Due to delicious food during the trip i got 2 kilos, feeling a bit clumsy.

12.09.2017 - Morning Session - LCM 4000m

100m easy

Set1: 1500m crawl with paddles (20:50, pace:1:23, 1st 500m:7:04, 2nd 500m:6:56, 3rd 500m:6:49)

100 easy

Set2: 1500m crawl hand drag drill (23:14, pace:1:33)

100m easy

Set3: 10x50m crawl R:5" - 400m race pace (recoveries included total time: 7:19)

200 easy

Note: It was quite chilly in the morning, the water temperature is about 19 centigrades, i was again the only person in the pool swimming in the morning. Such being the case I began the set1 with moderate pace and unconsciously increased the tempo from 1:24 to 1:22. It is good to see that I can achieve descending pace.

On the 6-7-8th of October there is will be Aquamasters Arena competitions in Bodrum (one of the best resorts in Aegean Sea near to my homeland Izmir).

There will be 1.5, 3 and 6K events in Sea Garden Hotel's Bay.

The organization is quite prestigious among the other races n Turkey, there will be tough opponents. The accomodation will be in a 5 star hotel Hapimag Sea Garden Resort.
Last year Adam Walker of England also was there, dont know this year whether or not.

About the organization:
http://www.aquamasters.org/

About the hotel:
http://www.hapimag-seagarden.com/en.html
https://www.etstur.com/Hapimag-Resort-Sea-Garden
https://www.tripadvisor.com.tr/Hotel_Review-g298665-d295822-Reviews-Hapimag_Resort_Sea_Garden-Yaliciftlik_Bodrum_Mugla_Province_Turkish_Aegean_Coast.html

I enrolled in the below events:
- 6th Oct.  Friday Night Full Moon 500m swim
- 7th Oct. Saturday 4x500m Relay(composed a 4 people team with my students)
- 8th Oct. Sunday Individual 3K

In any case, it will be good way to test my new technique (block and straight arm with more body roll and a bit punchy stroke) and also will be wisecracking with my students

good luck with your upcoming races Nightcrawler!


There was a triathlete in the pool. his kick still had a lot of bicycle kick in it. his arm strokes wernt great either. He was only halfway of looking like a swimmer. training 5 times a week on swimming. could swim 1500 m in 22 minutes. 5 years swimming experience. he was pretty fitt.