The March 20 New York Times ran a great article on swimmer Ryan Lochte, "the best American male swimmer not named Michael." While it was interesting to read about his training, the best part of the piece was how we, mere mortals, can incorporate some of his training techniques to our own advantage. The article cited three things that Ryan does that any swimmer can emulate:
* Slow things WAAAAAY down when working on technique.
* Use a pull buoy to work on body position. (I could kiss this kid for making the pull buoy more than a crutch!)
* Work on kicking. As they said in the article, the top coaches have found that less volume with more kicking = world records.
I know as triathletes we have to balance the ROI in kicking sets vs. exhausted legs for tomorrow's ride or run. But I can tell you that kicking is now a major emphasis on my boys' club team, and it's made a huge difference in my kids' race times.
Here's the link to the article.
