Lately I’ve had 3 clients who have trained really hard for several months for their triathlon race. They’ve been diligently working on their swim technique and confidence in the swimming pool and outside in open water.
But when race day came they were disappointed with their triathlon swim and had to resort to breast stroke or hold on to a kayak while they caught their breath.
All three clients were perfectly capable of completing the swim with non stop front crawl in a respectable time and had done so many times previously.
They had done plenty of training but just made a few errors on race day that caused them to have a challenging swim that was slower than they wanted.
So here are my 7 top tips to have a faster triathlon swim.
1. Pre-Race Nerves and Panic
There’s a lot of hanging about before the start of a triathlon so it’s easy to really stress yourself out about the swim before it’s even started!
In my most recent race at Holkham Sprint there was a 30min gap between the race briefing and the start of the race.
On top of that somehow, I was in the first wave with the fastest swimmers and the music was pumping out with the organisers ramping up the energy levels.
Despite my 20 years of triathlon experience and being a reasonable swimmer, I was still getting psyched out! I could feel myself getting intimidated by all the fit and fast looking people around me and starting to feel nervous and stressed.
Fortunately, I can notice all this happening to me. I’m now aware of where my mind and confidence go. So instead of spending 30minutes crapping myself and getting more and anxious I spent the time distracting myself by chatting to people, looking at the surroundings and some slow calm breathing.
So, expect all this to happen and have a strategy for race day nerves. Plan for it in advance and try and keep yourself energised but calm.
2. Your wetsuit has shrunk
You’re getting ready for your triathlon swim getting your wetsuit on nice and early. But you can’t breathe, and you can’t move. Wetsuits are tight and restrictive. This can be 10 times worse if you haven’t put it on properly. No matter how long you’ve spent putting your wetsuit on, take another 5 minutes to pull it up properly.
The trousers can come up your legs so inch the material up your shins. Make sure the crotch area is properly in your crotch. Slide more loose material up your stomach, chest and neck. Then your arms and the backs of your shoulders. Get a friend to help you if need be. Done that? Do it a little bit more.
3. Go out too fast!
You get caught up in the energy of the race and go out like a bat out of hell, after all it is a race. Only to be out of oxygen and struggling to get a breath by the time you get to the first buoy. And then it all falls apart. Maybe you have to stop or do breaststroke to get your breath back.
The challenge with the triathlon swim is also the difficulty of doing a good warm up. Often you’ll go from standing still to all out, just like that! So treat the first few hundred metres to the first buoy as the warm up.
Start slowly. More slowly than you think is possible. It should feel too easy at the start. Then slowly build up as you get settled into to your stroke.
As you gain more experience and your stroke improves you’ll gradually be able to start the swim faster.
4. Forgetting to breathe
You go out at a sprint and do 20 strokes before taking a breath. Perhaps it also feels freezing cold and you haven’t been allowed a warm up. Then, you forget to exhale and in all the race day stress you’re holding your breath and working really hard. It’s really simple just focus on blowing bubbles out your nose and your normal breathing patterns. In a race I generally recommend breathing every 2 because you need to get oxygen quickly.
5. Start in the wrong place
Usually, people over estimate their speed and start in a group that’s too fast for them. The problem with this is that you’re likely to work too hard to keep up with people around you, but also, you’ll be swum over by all the faster people coming past.
I have also made the mistake of starting too far back and then had trouble swimming through slower swimmers in front of me.
Take the time to really think about how fast you are and make a conservative guess about your speed and where to start from.
In training it’s good to actually do a time trial for the distance you’re going to race so you have a fairly accurate idea about what to aim for.
6. Sighting too often
If you go off course, you’ll have to swim further and time. But equally if you sight every 3 or 4 strokes, you’ll also be very slow and exhausted. Every time you look up to sight it makes your legs sink.
I recommend not sighting more often than every 6 strokes. And if your technique and stroke is good then more like every 9 or 12 strokes.
Also remember when you sight, you’re not expecting to see everything but rather just a quick glimpse. If you don’t see what you need, you’ll do some more strokes and then take another look.
7. Forgetting about technique
In the adrenaline and panic of the race you don’t give a single thought to your actual stroke. It’s very common for adult triathletes to find that when they try and swim fast, they often swim the same pace but put lots of effort in and burn lots of energy.
This is usually because you still have work to do your stroke efficiency and being able to hold your form and different effort levels. So, if you don’t give your technique any thought even during a race, there’s a high chance you’ll be splashy out of breath mess.
Let me know if any of these tips help. And if you want to chat about it more then book in for a FREE “Let’s Chat” and we can talk about it more.
More Tips
- Simple tips to improve your front crawl swimming
- How should I breathe in front crawl
- Should triathletes even bother improving their front crawl?
