Weightless gliding in the water is not only a goal, but a prerequisite for swimming. Unlike sports on solid ground, swimming challenges the muscles and relieves the skeleton. In this blog article I show what is important when swimming and how to ensure and coordinate buoyancy and propulsion. The article is aimed at both non-swimmers and swimmers. Wikipedia defines swimming as the non-submersion of a body in a liquid and the locomotion of living beings in water. Not sinking is referred to as buoyancy, active and targeted movement as propulsion. Regardless of the individual swimming style such as breaststroke, backstroke, front crawl or dolphin swimming, only two things are decisive when swimming: buoyancy (not sinking) and propulsion (swimming in a certain direction) with lifeguard training.
With an optimal, streamlined position in the water, you can swim faster and further with the same effort.
The biggest challenge in swimming is buoyancy. Non-swimmers have certainly noticed this when they first try to swim, which sometimes ends with a lot of water in their stomachs and coughing. Even experienced swimmers struggle with buoyancy when swimming, but they know how to achieve it. A body will float if it displaces as much liquid as it weighs. A stone is heavy in relation to its surface area and sinks immediately in water. A leaf or a piece of wood, on the other hand, has a large surface area in relation to its weight, so it floats on the water surface. When I swim, I gain buoyancy by increasing the surface area of my body. This enables me to displace more water and stay on the water surface. With the right position in the water and posture, buoyancy in the water can be achieved very easily. It is therefore particularly important for non-swimmers and swimming beginners to get their head into the water as quickly as possible in order to increase the surface area and improve buoyancy. The buoyancy can thus be “passively” optimized even without using arms and legs as buoyancy aids. The work of the arms and legs in swimming focuses on generating propulsion, speed and direction.
The water position of the body is also decisive. If this is optimal, i.e. streamlined, you can swim faster and further with the same effort. Or constant speed and with less power.
Here are two exercises that improve buoyancy and propulsion when learning to swim:
Exercise 1: “Dead Man”
Whether you do this exercise on your stomach or on your back does not matter and depends on your personal preferences. Lie flat in the water and pay attention to how your body behaves in the water. Your legs will probably sag first. Now try to stretch your body completely by tensing your stomach and buttocks and shifting your focus towards the chest and head. So lean into the water. Your lungs are like a buoy or a balloon here. Try to lie on it and also actively push your head into the water. If you find this exercise difficult at the beginning in the water, you can practice it on solid ground beforehand. To do this, lie on your back on the floor. Now try to touch the floor over your entire body (from your head to your heels). By that I mean the entire spine. You will have to tilt your pelvis to get your lumbar spine to touch the floor. If you can do that, then you have found the perfect water position for swimming! At first, this posture is certainly a bit unusual, as we are not used to it on solid ground. But with a little practice, you’ll soon be able to do it very easily!
Exercise 2: Swim down!
Once you’ve mastered Exercise 1, try doing a prone swim with crawlers while reaching for your arms toward the floor. Really actively stretch your arms down. Make sure not to dive with your head, but only pull your arms down away from your shoulders. With this exercise you create more pressure on the chest. Do you know what happens then? No matter how hard you try, you won’t get an inch closer to the pelvic floor. But with the pressure you put on your chest, your lower body and legs suddenly lift up. Maybe even your bottom and legs come out of the water. So you have reached a flat water position!
Exactly like that, with this tension in your upper body, you should swim from now on. Regardless of the swimming style used! This exercise will help you master the basic rule of swimming, buoyancy. From now on you can concentrate on propulsion.