Today we moved into learning a relaxed recovery. My drills for this week will have me swimming continuously for one length, incorporating breathing with the drill. I don't need to worry about my kick, though.

This lesson was hard for me; there is a lot I need to coordinate. My kick is an absolute mess right now. I will see if during the week I can calm it down some as I get more natural at doing the rest of the drill.

So, just for my own  sake of remembering what I'm supposed to do this week.

Focus on:

  • Keeping my head down and in alignment with my body while swimming.
  • Breathing by rotating my body slightly and then rotating just my head a bit beyond that. My head should still stay in alignment with my spine. I should rotate my head just enough for my mouth to clear the water; there should still be one goggle lens submersed below the water.
  • Keeping my arms on a wide track. I am not looking for a compact recovery. If my hand is near my body its weight will drive me down in the water. If I keep it wide it will be easier to maintain my balance.
  • Leading with my elbow and keeping my entire forearm and hand loose.
  • Using a weight shift, driven from the hip to propel my recovery arm into the water and my body forward. Don't reach with my recovery arm.
  • Keeping my finger tips pointed down from entry into the water all the way through the catch.

The sequence of the drills is that I will first start with just my elbow slightly above the water on the recovery. Then my fingertips will still drag through the water. Progress to having my fingertip just above the water. Finish with the "ear hop."

I think it will be good for me to do some warmup practice standing still doing the wide recovery leading from the elbow.

After last week's lesson, I wasn't sure I was going to master the skill in just one week. As it turned out a week was more than sufficient. Today I'm not so sure that I can master the recovery in just one week. I'll have to see how it goes.

The coach reminded me again that each practice should be no more than about 30 minutes.

Additional observation: I felt like there were some moments when I was practicing the drills with the coach that I was able to feel my body propel forward when I completed the switch from the lead arm to the recovery arm.