FREESTYLE - Synchro Swim

What Is It?:
Synchro Swim isn't about putting on makeup and a flowered suit and doing those leg-whirlie things in the pool. That's the REALLY HARD brand of synchro swimming - the one that requires noseclips and lungs of steel. We're talking about a different variety of synchro swim, where all you need to do is swim stroke for stroke with one or more swimmers.

Why Do It:
The most important reason to try Synchro Swim is because it's challenging in a FUN way. It makes you focus on HOW you swim, and on how you swim in relation to other swimmers. It increases your awareness in a fun way.

To be really good at Synchro Swim, you have to be able to make rapid adjustments in your stroke. You need to be able to glide a little longer between strokes - or to shorten your stroke if necessary to match your partner. Sometimes you have to be ready to SKIP a stroke to get back in synch. In order to make these kinds of on-the-fly adjustments, you have to have good balance. And you have to swim with a steady rhythm. If you have an erratic stroke rhythm, you will find yourself swimming alone on the next Sychro Swim set, because no one will want to choose you as a partner. Above all, Synchro Swim calls for the ability - or the willingness - to COMPROMISE. If you just do your own thing and hope that everyone else will swim YOUR WAY, your group may end up looking like a train wreck.

One of the added benefits of Synchro Swim is that it can help prepare you for the crowded conditions at the start of a triathlon. The four young swimmers that you see in the lead on the video clip are actually four CHAMPION triathletes from Mexico. They came all the way from Oaxaca to attend our summer camp in Pennsylvania.

How To Do It:
Synchro Swim is pretty easy. Just choose one or more partners, decide what stroke you are going to swim (this works well for other strokes, too), then push off and GO. You'll quickly figure out what you need to do.

If you don't succeed on your first length, try again.

How To Do It Really Well (the Fine Points):
1. Once you get the hang of it, try picking up the pace.

2. Once you can match strokes with one partner, try three or more partners if you have a wide lane.

3. Switch partners. Try pairing a tall swimmer with a short swimmer...or an accomplished swimmer with a beginning swimmer.

4. Try doing this with a partner in open water (a lake is ideal). It's mesmerizing if you can keep it going for several hundred yards.