Understanding the proper timing and breaststroke is one of the trickiest things about breaststroke. One of my favorite all time drills in order to teach people is separation drill. This is where you completely separate the pull from the kick.

The path of this drill is pretty simple. You take a pull with no kick at all. Keep the legs as rigid and straight as possible. And once you get back down into the line underwater, glide for just a bit and then you add the breaststroke kick. So it's the pull with no kick. Pause. Get back into line and then kick breaststroke.

You'll then come up for a stroke and a breath and repeat this process.

The idea that we're trying to get across here is that the pull and the kick are not as closely integrated as people think. You don't kick your hands forward. We want to get rid of the feeling of the kick driving the hands forward.

When we look at timing, we want the hands completely out front before the kick comes in so that the resistance that the recovery creates is done before the propulsion of the kick comes in. You notice our swimmer right here is using a dolphin kick to send his hands forward.

This is what you will instinctively feel and want to do, but something that you need to avoid. This still supports the process that the kick is driving the hands forward.

So go back to making sure that the legs do nothing during the pull and then do the kick independently of everything else.

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Separation Drill