Swimming Technique Book (Swimsmooth, Speed Secrets, TI)?

Training
1

Hello!

Our local pool will re-open in October after a year long renovation and I’m thinking about using this opportunity to work on my freestyle technique. I’m no competitive triathlete, but I used to cycle, run and swim to keep things interesting.

Can anyone recommend a good book about swimming technique? I looked into the following options:

  • SwimSmooth: Seems very popular. Reading the preview it seemed a lot of drill information (videos) was free on youtube, but I can’t find it now. I somehow only end up at their SwimSmooth Guru site which requires a subscription for the drill videos. Does the book alone works? I’m not a huge fan of removing free content and putting it behind a paywall…
    *Total Immersion: Seems also very popular. Apparently different than SwimSmooth and sometimes negatively discussed (overgliding).
  • Swim Speed Secrets: Got good reviews on amazon, Drill Videos can be easily found on Youtube. I don’t know if this maybe to pointy edge for me?
  • Swim Speed Workouts: Has a workout plan which can be followed, don’t know if this would work alone or only with the Secrets book together.
  • Swim Speed Strokes: Not freestyle specific, but maybe working on the other strokes can make me a better athlete overall?

Any other books, opinions or possible combinations welcome! Thanks

2

I went on a TI weekend workshop. It made a huge difference to my swimming

3

Have a look at the Tower26 stuff.

It’s pretty good and worked for me.

4

TI will make you an efficient swimmer. Call it overgliding or becoming more efficient without wasting extra energy. This is especially necessary when doing long distance swims followed by the bike, and then the run. Teaches hydrodynamics if I recall correctly.

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5

Thanks for the suggestions. I’ll give it a try!

6

TI book is wordy - the DVD is a must.

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7

TI i hear is to get your form right. Get you from 0 to efficient hero.

Swim smooth caters to more different and higher levels of swimmers.
From what i understand the subscription is pretty cheap, 1st month is free… you can go over the drills in the first month with the videos and then decide whether you want to pay the low fee. I guess once you’ve got a few dozen drills to practice you can just “remember” them, takes notes and repeat to get better.

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8

There’s effortless swimming as well. 50ish dollars a year but he posts a LOT of content on YouTube for free