All Strokes - Eric Shanteau

Important Note to the Viewer

LESSONS: 34 VIDEOS

Butterfly - Body - Head - Eye Position

In the 200 or 400 IM, how you handle the butterfly can mean the difference between a great race...and a very painful race. For me, the butterfly leg is all about easy speed. I want to be out fast, but not exert myself too much. I do this by laying off the legs a little bit, and concentrating on body position -- getting my power from the chest and hips. By working the chest and hips, I conserve energy but at the same time I can be a little aggressive and not lay back all the way. The chest and hips give me easy speed. The big thing on body position on butterfly is pressing down with your chest. Pressing the chest gets your whole butterfly motion moving. I try to press the chest down at the top of the stroke -- right as the hands are entering. As my chest goes down, my hips go up, and this lets me get power out of my core, and not just from my arms and legs. When I think about head and eye position on butterfly, the main thing is to keep my head down and to keep looking down and not forward -- except when I start to come up for the breath. But even during the breath, I try to keep my head tilted down. If you were standing at the end of the pool, you’d see a little bit of my face, but it’s not like a full-on front shot of my face. I try to breathe as low as possible. Another key concept on head and body position is that the head goes in first -- before the hands. And when the head goes in, it stays higher than the chest. This overall body position -- chest down with hips, arms and head UP -- helps my pull and recovery, which we’ll talk about in the next section.

Butterfly - Arm Action

Having good body position is important in every stroke, but it’s really important in butterfly because it sets up the pull. For me, good body position is having the chest go deep and leaving the hands and elbows near the surface as my hands enter. I think about getting a quick catch with high elbows right at the beginning of the pull. The first thing I want to do is to hold some water by sculling out a little bit and keeping the elbows high. I try to hold every bit of water that I can, coming from a high elbow. Some people will say, “Pull as wide as you can and start with a wide pull.” But what I think about is keeping a more narrow pull. The easiest way to describe my pull is that it’s like a keyhole or an “S” shape that I draw under my body. As the hands come down past my chest, bellybutton and hips, I want them to be closer together rather than far apart. A narrow pull with the hands close together under my body helps me finish the stroke with more power. But no matter how wide your pull is, the key point is to start with the hands and elbows up near the surface so you get a great connection and so you can hang on to more water. At the finish of the pull I think about pressing through beyond the hips. My hands don’t necessarily exit way beyond my hips, but that’s what it feels like they’re doing. I try to feel like I’m pressing all the way through the stroke -- as if I were trying to flip water at the end of the pull. The flip may end up going OUT rather than back, but I like to feel that I’m pulling all the way through and really extending my arms at the end. When I recover my arms over the water, my goal is to relax the arms as much as possible. I try to keep the arms close to the surface with palms back and thumbs angled down toward the water. “Relaxed” is the key word. I like the hands to enter about shoulder width apart. This lets me press down on the chest and it gives me a good body position to start the next pull.

Butterfly - Kick

When most people watch my dolphin kick, they think it’s all about the hips and the chest. That’s partly true, but what I’m really thinking about is... ...my feet. On the butterfly kick, my big focus point is keeping the balls of my feet together...rather than keeping my heels together. When I keep the balls of my feet together, they catch and hold more water -- way more than if I keep the heels together. The front of your feet is where you get all of your catch in the dolphin kick. It’s a little thing -- just a small shift in your thought process -- but it’s made a big difference in how much power I get out of the kick. I try to keep the balls of the feet together and just whip through to deliver the kick. But, the dolphin kick is more than just the feet. For me, the dolphin kick starts at the hips. A lot of people say a dolphin kick should be a full-body motion but, for me, it starts with the hips, and everything else just follows. Hips...knees...ankles...and all the way through to the ends of your feet. I keep the kick small and quick, and let it flow from hips to toes.

Butterfly - Timing

Butterfly timing, for me, is all about having a down kick when my arms are out front entering the water. If I can place the down kick right here...as the hands enter... everything else falls into place. Here you can see it from another angle. I kick down as the hands enter... and kick down again as the hands exit. But, for me, what sets the timing is the first down kick as the hands enter the water.

Butterfly - Drills

1/1/1 Butterfly My favorite butterfly drill is definitely one right arm, one left arm, one full stroke. I breathe to my right...breathe to my left...and take a full stroke without taking a breath. My focus is keeping the arms low to the water. I like this drill because it lets me work on my arm recovery and body rhythm without getting fatigued. 5 Kicks/2 Strokes Butterfly 5 Kicks/2 Strokes helps you breathe low to the water and helps you get the feeling of butterfly undulation, both in your kick and in your actual stroke. Start with 5 kicks...come up and take 2 strokes fly...then dive back down and take 5 more dolphin kicks. Eddie Reese loves this drill. You can see how it teaches the body motion and how to fit the kick and the arms into the overall stroke.

Backstroke - Body - Head - Eye Position

Backstroke, for me, is a work in progress. I know what I’m supposed to do -- and these are the basic things like keeping your head steady...and thumb out...pinky in...and not over-reaching. But knowing what to do -- and knowing how to teach it -- doesn’t mean it always happens that way. Backstroke is something I really have to think about and work on. What I think about most is connetion. And by that I mean connecting the hips to the shoulders as you rotate. With backstroke and freestyle, if you’ve got good core strength you’re going to be in a good body position and will be able to hold yourself in a nice straight line. Once you’ve got that straight line, backstroke is mostly about rotation and how well you can connect your hip rotation to your shoulder rotation. It’s the rotation that dictates the stroke. In this clip, focus just on the hips and shoulders. As the left shoulder rotates down through the pull, your left hip is going to drop. This enables you to use your entire body to pull your arm through the water. Watch it again from another angle. Notice how the same-side shoulder and hip are connected. By connecting shoulder and hip, I use my entire body to pull through the water -- rather than just using my arm to pull through the water. Body position, for me, means rotation and staying connected. And it’s a full-body rotation. As I swim, I rotate shoulders, torso, hips, legs, and even my feet. I definitely think about keeping my head still, but if a little bit of head movement will help my rotation, I’ll move my head. But I mean like a very very little bit. For eye position, I don’t think about looking straight up. I think about tilting my chin down slightly, and then looking at almost a 45-degree angle. In this final clip, watch the rotation and how each hip follows the hand into the water. I use the rotation to set up a powerful catch and pull, which is what we’ll cover in the next section.

Backstroke - Arm Action

Backstroke pull is another example where I know what I should be doing, but have to work really hard to make it happen. What I should do -- and what every swimmer wants to do -- is grab a lot of water and hold on to it for the entire pull. What often happens is that we let the hands sit on the water rather than sending them into an immediate catch. Where I struggle -- especially with my left hand -- is that I have a habit of placing my hand in the water rather than letting it fall into the water. You can see it in this clip. The right hand goes immediately into the catch. With the left hand there’s a bit of a hitch. What I focus on with the pull -- and this is something every swimmer can focus on -- is using hip and shoulder rotation to drive the hand into the water and into the catch. I think about trying to engage the left side of my core -- those left obliques -- as I enter the hand, grab water, and pull. I try to get all that I can out of my body -- to aid the pull. The ideal stroke is when the arms just flow into the catch and through the pull. When the shoulders and hips are connected, the arms can just flow. As I recover the arms, my main thought is to go straight over the top, and I want the hands to enter at 11 and 1. From under water it looks like this: Head is steady. Right arm enters at 1 and left arm enters at 11. The hands go immediately into the catch and grab as much water as possible.

Backstroke - Kick

A lot of great backstrokers will tell you that the kick drives their stroke. But for me, backstroke is just one part of an IM race and not the main event. In the IM, a big, powerful kick would cost me too much energy, so I think a smaller, tighter backstroke kick is the way to go. I keep the kick small and quick and steady. The toes are always pointed -- and I let my feet flow with my hips and body rotation. Instead of kicking straight up and down, the feet roll from side to side, following right along with the rotation of the hips.

Backstroke - Timing

Backstroke timing, for me, is all about letting my hands go, and allowing them to flow through the recovery and into the catch. What sets the cadence is how much time the arm spends outside the water. The shorter the time, the faster the stroke. And the faster the stroke, the more forcefully the hand will enter, catch, and pull. You want to have a steady kick all the way through the stroke, but I don’t think your kick should dictate your timing. Timing comes from the tempo of your arms. What helps your tempo is being connected from your shoulders down to your hips. So if you have a good roll in your stroke from side to side, it will be easier for you to let your arms go and get them around a bit quicker. Everything is connected. Timing is really important when you transition from butterfly to backstroke in the IM -- especially in a long-course pool. What I try to do is come up and take two to three strokes of backstroke, keeping it relaxed and just kind of calming down and finding my stroke. A huge mistake is that people push off the wall, pop up, and immediately start spinning their wheels on backstroke. On those first few strokes it’s essential to just relax. Get into the different stroke and then you can try to increase your arm cadence throughout the backstroke leg.

Backstroke - Drills

Backstroke Spin Drill The best backstroke drill but probably my least favorite is Spin Drill. It works on my weakness, which is getting my hands to enter the water more aggressively. If you have a tendency to let your hands sit on the water, Spin Drill will take care of that. Actually, this should be called Sitting-Up Drill. What I try to do is sit up and throw my head from side to side to get more rotation into the drill. This is a very good drill for backstroke, but you shouldn’t do more than a 50 of it. Some people will do 200s of spin drill but that defeats the purpose. You can do a good, quality spin drill for only a 25 or 50. Then follow it up with regular backstroke, focusing on an aggressive hand entry and immediate catch.

Breaststroke - Body - Head - Eye Position

As you watch how I swim breaststroke, and as you try to add some of the concepts to your own stroke, keep in mind that they may feel odd at first...and they may not work for you. Four years ago, my breaststroke looked like this. My pull was narrow, and I kept my head down pretty much through the entire stroke. When I came to Austin, the first thing Eddie Reese did was change my stroke to look more like this. I thought he was crazy. Breaststroke was my best stroke, and he wanted to turn it completely upside down. Going from this kind of head/eye position... ...to this...was really hard. It felt awful at first. Not natural at all. But after a couple of months my times started to drop. After a year, the new stroke felt better but still weird. And after two years, in 2008...well, I probably wouldn’t have made the Olympic team without the new stroke. The message is that you can’t be afraid to try new things, even when they feel awkward and unnatural at first. If your coach asks you to do something different, just give it a try, stick with it for a while, and see how it works. Breaststroke is all about minimizing resistance and minimizing your dead spots. What’s tricky is that the point when you have least resistance is here.......but if you hold that position for too long, it becomes a dead spot in your stroke. I try to achieve a streamlined body position on every stroke. Here it is again on the next cycle. The body is in streamline with arms extended, head between arms, eyes down, hips high, legs long, feet together, and toes pointed. This is a very good line to have, and you want to get in this position on each stroke. But you don’t want to spend a whole lot of time in that line. In a 200 breaststroke or on the breaststroke leg of a 400 IM, you might spend some time in this position, riding the legs and gliding a bit. But if you ride the legs too long, you risk losing your momentum. For me, I never want to have the hands stop moving. So as soon as I recover the hands forward -- as soon as I reach streamline -- I let them start to slide out to start the next stroke. Here’s another angle where you can see that I get into streamline, with head and eyes down, on every stroke. But my hands are constantly moving and I’m maintaining forward momentum. I don’t want the glide to become a dead spot. When I get to the breaststroke leg on the IM, I’m thinking more about my arms than my legs. I like to come up and stay long and controlled on the first couple of strokes, but then I don’t want to ride the glide too long. I get into streamline but try to keep the hands moving.

Breaststroke - Arm Action

When I swim breaststroke, I think about keeping my hands and arms in constant motion. I get my body into a straight line on every stroke, but once I get there, the hands separate and start to slide apart. As the hands separate, the palms turn and the thumbs point toward the bottom of the pool. The first part of my pull -- the initial outsweep of the hands -- is slow and controlled. I think about sliding the hands out rather than pushing them out. I’m not putting a lot of work or force into this move. I’m just keeping the hands moving. In this clip, notice my body position as the hands start to slide out. My head and eyes are still down, my hips are high, legs together and long, and my toes are pointed. I’m pressing just a bit with the chest, but overall I’m in a very long and straight line. As the hands continue the outsweep, I think about setting up a nice wide pull and accelerating into the corners. It almost feels like I’m sweeping the hands toward the sides of the pool. If we stop it here...at the widest point of the outsweep, my fingertips are pointed toward the lane lines. When my hands are at the widest part of the pull -- at the corners -- notice that my face is still in the water. I’ve started to pick up my head and look forward a little bit, but my head is still in the water. Everything happens quickly at this point. My head continues to lift, and this helps me accelerate my hands around the corners and into the insweep. From head on above the surface, you can see that I’m lifting my head straight up and looking straight down the pool as I take my breath. This extra head movement is very different from my old stroke, and it took two years for it to feel natural. But lifting the head helps me get around the corners and into the insweep. From the side, you can see the other thing that’s going on as my hands come around the corners. Watch the hips. If we slow it down, you can see that as the head lifts up and the hands come around the corners, my hips slide forward. I’m actually pulling my hips forward and this helps me get the hands around the corners and get them back up under my body. And pulling the hips forward helps me push the hands back out front into streamline. Also notice that as I slide the hips forward, my legs are still long and together and just beginning to set up for the kick. At this point, with the hips under my body, I’m thinking about getting the hands back out front as quickly as possible. I want to keep the hands moving. I recover my hands out of the water, because it’s easier to move them through air than to push them through the water. I recover them almost as if I’m praying. As soon as the hands reach forward, I’m already shifting the palms and pointing the thumbs toward the bottom of the pool -- ready to start the outsweep and start holding and catching all that water. Here’s the whole sequence. Brief streamline. Head stays under as the hands sweep out. At the widest point the head and eyes start to lift. The lift helps me accelerate around the corners and slide the hips forward, which helps me spin the hands back to the front and into the next cycle. When you try this with your own stroke, the tricky part is the transitions -- between eyes down...eyes forward...and eyes down again. It’s easy to look forward as you’re coming up for the breath. The hard part is getting the head and eyes back down for the streamline and the glide. If you simply lean your head down after the breath and continue to look forward -- like this -- you never achieve an ideal body line for breaststroke. To minimize resistance, you lift the head and eyes up for the breath, then get the head back in line and into streamline.