No matter how experienced a swimmer you are, there are always actionable tips to help you swim faster. Even if you’re familiar with them already, one of the great things about swimming is that you can always hone your swim technique a little more, and you can always improve your workouts, eating habits, and other habits that contribute overall to your swim speed and stamina.
The following tips to help you swim faster mostly revolve around decreasing drag in the water, staving off fatigue, building strength and endurance, and properly energizing. And because there are so many aspects to boosting swim speed, you can always find new ways to improve in these categories.
How to Swim Faster
- Avoid holding your head up high (which is usually a result of looking forward), as this sinks your feet, increasing drag and bringing on fatigue sooner
- When you push off in a flip turn, make sure your head, knees, and toes are all facing at least slightly upwards
- Don’t expend too much energy on kicking as hard as you can; kicking provides only about 10 percent of your propulsion while swimming, while the other 90 percent comes from your arm strokes
- Kick steadily from the hips for stronger propulsion, and don’t bend your knees when you kick, because this increases your surface area and resistance
- Don’t point your toes out straight behind you and lock up your ankles while you kick
- Strengthen your streamline to get air faster
- Be conscious about optimized breakouts, rather than just going through the motions, until it becomes automatic habit
- No matter how experienced a swimmer you are, there are always ways to improve your strokes; doing so will propel you faster through the water and further delay the onset of fatigue
- Make sure you fully extend you arms at the start and end of each stroke, as short strokes slow you down
- Work on rolling more smoothly and consistently from side to side with each stroke, rather than keeping your bellybutton pointed straight down
- Use these swim exercises to strengthen your core as part of your regular in-water workout routine
- Also, incorporate these dry-land exercises for swimmers into your out-of-water workout routine
- Practice yoga, tai chi, or a similar movement-based exercise that improves flexibility, range of motion, and your general movement mechanics
- Avoid heavy, greasy, fried, fatty, and spicy meals for at least 12 hours before swims
- Don’t rely on caffeine, sugar, or refined grains consisting of simple carbs to fuel you for a swim, as these inevitably lead to an energy crash
- Eat complex carbs from foods like whole grains, legumes, nuts, and seeds, as well as lean protein, to provide energy for your swims
