Tips To Help You Learn Elementary Backstroke Faster

I've asked a few people to write down for me my own personal experience in learning to swim. This swimmer chose Backstroke for his tips.

Backstroke Viewed From Below

These are not my students an I may or may not agree with the way they were taught but I thought that it would be a useful exercise to read other people experience in swimming.

When you have finished reading please feel free to share your favourite Swimming tip.

Enjoy
   Richard

When I set out for my first swimming lesson, I remember thinking; this is the first day of my life as a swimming guru.

Well, maybe I was right but things got worse before they got better.

Of all the swims strokes that I learned and have over the years perfected, backstroke was the trickiest.

My biggest problem at first was dealing with this fear I had about lying on my back in the water. I kept thinking that I would sink. But my instructor taught me some lessons that have been very valuable to me.

Lesson one: buoyancy can never fail you I always had this fear that when I lie on my back, or in any position in the water for that matter, I would sink. Well, it came from the mouthfuls of chlorinated water I had stomached the first few days. However, the tutor showed me that as long as I lay flat in the water, with my legs stretched out straight and the back of my head in the water, I would naturally float.

Of course, it took time to learn to let go, but I did. I realized that I kept sinking because I was bending the midsection of my body downwards.

Lesson two: moving in water So the first week of my backstroke training went to floating. Next, I had to learn how to move in the water. This is where things got really complicated for me.

I thought that the harder I hit the water with my feet, the faster I would move in the water. I couldn't have been more wrong.

I was taught the technique of fluttering the legs right. The secret as I came to learn was keeping your legs completely straight and tapping the water with your feet.

Lesson three: coordinating leg and arm movement After learning the right way to flutter my legs, I now had to learn how to propel myself forward.

I have to admit that I moved my hands very haphazardly at first. I would spend long minutes trying to make it across the pool.

That's where my faithful instructor came in. I learned the following from him:

The arms are supposed to make cyclic movements only that they do it backwards. I was told to imagine I was riding a bike, only I was doing it with my arms and backwards. When one arm was moving back, the other was supposed to be lying in a horizontal position on the side of my body. it was difficult at first but with time, it started feeling natural.

Lesson four: you have to practice to be perfect.

How good you get at swimming elementary backstroke depends on how hard you practice. I spent hours in the pool doing laps to achieve good results.

If you give yourself a target that you will get a few seconds faster every day, you will be on your way to success. It is also important to perfect your skill before you start on speed training.

With that in mind, learning elementary backstroke will be really simple.

written by: Azehnyna