Freestyle - Loper Drill

Hey... I'm just trying to figure it out for ME. :) This was fun to do this morning.

Must be on everyone's mind. One of the Masters swimmers that I coach asked about it this morning. I was trying it during my own swim time this morning. Initial reactions (besides the fact that it takes a lot of energy to do this type of stroke): Loping encourages you to take a quick breath...and it encourages you to really extend with the hand AND through the chest. It's the chest press that, to me, seems to hold the greatest potential benefit. It adds a bit of dolphin motion to the freestyle, and somehow gives more "flow" to the stroke.

I agree with Barbara that the chest pulse is a key component of this technique. Last spring I did a short underwater video session with a very fast sprinter who has this loping style, and I filmed him doing both freestyle and butterfly. The fact that I looked at both strokes one after the other made the chest pulse jump right out. As a matter of fact, in my note to his masters coach I said that it looked like he was doing one-arm butterfly on his right side (ignoring the kick), and more-or-less "normal" freestyle on his left side. So in any event, I am wondering if alternating lengths of one-arm fly with freestyle might be one way of introducing some loping into a freestyle stroke. Also if the focus is more on the chest pulse and less on the kick, I am wondering if a loping stroke can be done effectively at lower speeds and intensity levels.

Hi, guys may i interrupt you for a while. What happened to the Australian swimmers in Beijing Olympics? Where are great Australian swimmer's Ian Thorpe and Grant Hackett right now? Just curious. Thanks.

"Practice makes perfect."

Back home we called this "galloping". For a really long time actually I was a galloper. It worked good for my 100 free, alright for my 200 free (probably could have worked a lot better if I had better endurance - I would always just die), but horrible for my 50 free. It took a lot of effort to make my stroke more balanced, but when I got it down I made great strides in my 50 and my 100. When I see someone like Lezak or Phelps use this kind of stroke, it makes me wonder if I should go back to it, not for the 50 but maybe like the 100 or 200. I guess I'll just have to play around with it

Hi Micaela
Don't worry about what others will think about you. If it works for you, go for it! You won't feel silly at all on the podium.

Exhale Sprinter!

I have watched some very good lopers train.
They do sprint kick sets - and HARD - with FINZ and a SNORKLE - on a KICK BOARD!
Did I say HARD?

So yes, they are extremely strong kickers.
Most of us do not train enough kicking in our practices.

And while I have not seen them in the weight room, I know -since they have told me... the dryland training they do several times a week builds the power to sustain this type of stroke.

What I find amazing as well is the breathing on every stroke.
I get so nervous watching the finish of the sprint when these guys are breathing every stroke! But they know when to shut it down - and apparently the breath does not interupt the stroke before that finish stretch.

its a great drill ..i was teaching this one to my junior team ...it worked well ..thanks

Yeah Stan,

When I was teaching this variation to my high school swimmers I had them basically do a one-sided catchup. I had them try both the breathing side and the nonbreathing side to feel the difference.
It's also a lot like non-simultaneous arms in butterfly, but with a flutter kick at the back end.

Lots of kick required. Does anybody know how many beats Lezak and others use? It almost looks like arms and legs are decoupled, but I suppose that can't be completely true.