Intro: This is the TriDot podcast. TriDot uses your training data and genetic profile, combined with predictive analytics and artificial intelligence to optimize your training, giving you better results in less time with fewer injuries. Our podcast is here to educate, inspire, and entertain. We’ll talk all things triathlon with expert coaches and special guests. Join the conversation and let’s improve together.

Andrew Harley: Hey folks! Welcome to the show. Really solid swim conversation lined up today. If you are a triathlete and you know your swim needs a little help, this just might be the most useful episode we’ve ever done for you. And yes, I personally am in that category with my intermediate Swim Dot score. Definitely looking to learn from this show myself. Our first coach joining us today is Joanna Nami. Joanna is better known as Coach JoJo and has been coaching athletes with TriDot since 2012. She is the co-founder of Hissyfit Racing, a member of the Betty Design Elite Squad and at the moment has 16 IRONMAN finishes on her accomplished triathlon resume. Coach Jo has qualified for two IRONMAN World Championships and will be racing both St. George and Kona here in the year 2022. Coach Jo! I know you just love swim training more than anything else on this earth. Are you ready for our show today?

Joanna Nami: Oh more than ready. I’m always ready to talk about swim stroke.

Andrew: Also with us today is Coach Jeff Raines. Jeff is a USAT Level II and IRONMAN U certified coach who has a Masters of Science in exercise physiology and was a D1 collegiate runner.  He has over 45 IRONMAN event finishes to his credit, and has coached hundreds of athletes to the IRONMAN finish line. Jeff, are you ready to slip into swim coach mode here on the show today?

Jeff Raines: Absolutely! Great episode here and though I’ve known Coach JoJo for maybe five or six years now and she’s been on the podcast, this is my first episode with Coach Jo. So I’m looking forward to today. Absolutely.

Andrew: I’m Andrew the Average Triathlete, Voice of the People and Captain of the Middle of the Pack. As always we'll roll through our warm up question, settle in for our swim focused main set conversation, and then wind things down with our cool down.

If you are a listener and you don’t use TriDot for your triathlon training, we’re glad you’re here. Our podcast exists for all triathletes and right now we actually are looking for non-TriDot athletes to participate in our preseason research project. You get two months of free triathlon training and we get data that helps make TriDot better and better. It’s a win-win all the way around. So head to TriDot.com/PSP. That’s TriDot.com/PSP to check it out.

Warm up theme: Time to warm up! Let’s get moving.

Andrew: With multiple dips in and out of chlorinated and other bodies of water it’s encouraged to pick up a new swimsuit here and there to keep your rotation fresh. As such, most of us probably have had a few variety of brands, prints, and styles of swimsuits from season to season in our tri journeys. Jo, Jeff, what swimsuit is hands down your favorite to date? I want to know the brand, I want to know the design, when you had it, and what made it stand out for you. So Coach Jeff Raines, what do you think here?

Jeff: I love my custom TriDot swim jammers from Rocket Science. They fit me well. They last a long time. They don’t become see-through as early as other products I’ve used in the past with that chlorine eating through the fabric. They’re a great conversation starter at the pool. A lot of people see that bright red. “Hey what is that TriDot?” That bright red down kind of the outside of the quads there and it’s just a great opportunity to introduce TriDot. I have three pair of those. I rotate them through just to make them last. Unlike Dr. B.J. Leeper, I don’t know if you guys have heard that episode with him. If y’all remember he has a very funny story about his see-through and even ripped on his booty crack, his pair of swim jammers. That has luckily never happened to me with my Rocket Science ones so far.

Andrew: Yeah four minutes into the show and we’re already talking about Dr. B.J. Leeper’s booty crack. So this episode is going swimmingly so far. But yes that was a very, very good podcast story from Dr. B.J. Leeper about having to swim in a pool on that certain occasion and his swim jammers were just falling apart as he was swimming for anybody who missed that particular episode. There’s a reason why his booty crack got a mention here today. It wasn’t just out of the blue. But Jeff, to your point, when you wear that TriDot gear at the pool it’s a great conversation starter. I live in the Fairmount Texas area for anybody else in the DFW metroplex. There’s a few pools in this area. I normally go to a certain pool, but there’s a certain day where I couldn’t get down to the pool during it’s open hours and so I had to go to the Fairmount Rec Center which is not normally my swim location and so while I’m swimming Fairmount Rec Center I’m just knocking out my laps, I see a lady walk into the swim area and she was wearing a TriDot swim kit and I had no idea who she was. I didn’t recognize her and kind of I mentally noted when I’m done with my set I might go over and say hey. Actually it was kind of during my lead up to IRONMAN Waco and I had a particularly longer swim set that day so she actually got in the pool and out of the pool before I was finished. So if you’re a podcast listener and you swim at the Fairmount Rec Center and you wear a TriDot kit chances are that was you that I saw. But yeah, so Jeff those TriDot swimsuits can certainly be a conversation piece and it can help you identify other TriDot athletes down at the pool. So nice pick there Jeff. Coach Jo, what is your all time, hands down favorite swimsuit you’ve used in your swim training?

Joanna: Well I may be sporting a TriDot trucker or beanie to the pool, but in the triathlon world where it’s very difficult to stay girly I have in addition to my Betty design swimsuits and bikinis, most women like to collect designer shoes, but I collect Betty swimwear.

Jeff: Nice.

Andrew: Nice.

Joanna: Try to stay girly.

Andrew: Yep, no I’m always jealous of the Betty kits. The Betty design kits always look good and Jo, just from all the races I’ve traveled to with you and other TriDot coaches I’ve met a lot of the Bettys and so at this point half of my Instagram feed on any given day is just Bettys showing what they’re up to in their training and the kits always look fresh. Always look good. For me, my insert here, I do like my TriDot swim jammers as well. But my favorite swim jammers, they’re actually not even swim jammers. They’re technically tri shorts. So back when we did our podcast episode with Rachael Maney from Bike Law, after that show Rachael actually sent John and I– because John Mayfield and I were on that episode with her, and she sent us some Bike Law swag. On that episode we were talking about cycling safety and John and I were talking about just how I like more colorful tri kits and John likes more black and classic tri kits. So she actually sent John a black Bike Law jersey and me a very colorful Bike Law jersey. It was very, very nice of her. But she sent me some Bike Law tri shorts that matched the jersey. I like the tri shorts for cycling, but actually I’ve found I just absolutely love them for swimming. I don’t know why. They don’t have like a waistband that you have to tie like most guy’s swim jammers. It’s just kind of like a really nice fitting spandex waist that just fits me really, really well and they’re nice and tight and they wear like they should in the pool and so those are my absolute favorite. It’s my Wattie Ink tri shorts from Bike Law and those are my absolute favorite swim jammers that I’ve used to date. They’re just really, really comfortable. I don’t have to tie anything and they have a nice fun pop of color to them. So we’re going to throw this question out to you guys like we always do on Monday, the day the show releases. Make sure that you are a part of the I AM TriDot Facebook group and we will throw the question out. What is your favorite swimsuit that you’ve ever worn down to the pool for your set?

Main set theme: On to the main set. Going in 3…2…1…

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Andrew: Yes it’s true! The swim is the shortest leg of a triathlon, but it’s also true that most triathletes come to multisport without a strong swim background. So most if not all of us can benefit from refining our swim form to help us nail the first leg of our race. One of the more popular episodes to date, currently our fourth most listened to episode of the podcast is episode 2, How to Remove 8 Common Barriers to Swim Improvement. Today’s episode will build off of what we talked about there as Coach Jo and Coach Jeff will walk us through the steps to refining our swim stroke. Now I know good and well how qualified each of you are for this conversation, but just to give everyone some context give us the rundown on your experience as a swimmer and coaching triathletes on their swim as well. Jeff, what’s your background coaching swim?

Jeff: Most immediately before going full time staff with TriDot I was the director of triathlon at Austin Aquatics and Sports Academy. It is a multi-sport facility down in Austin, Texas. It houses Austin Swim Club which anybody in kind of that private sector knows that Austin Swim Club is– they’re a heavy hitter. But at the time Brendan Hansen was their head coach. He was the GM of the facility and he was my mentor and also a good friend. So kind of having worked under him as far as swim coach and master’s and stuff like that. You know, he’s amazing and actually if you take a closer look at your daily TriDot swim sessions you’ll see Brendan Hansen swimming a lot of those drills there in the knowledge base for you. But I’ve done hundreds of stroke analysis through Austin Aquatics and TriDot at clinics, seminars, master swims, you name it there with Brendan Hansen.

Andrew: So Jo, you started coaching swim with very different beginnings from Jeff. Tell us about your experience.

Joanna: I’ve been a competitive swimmer since itty bitty. I tell most of my friends that I was about 3 when my dad threw me in the deep end of the pool and said…

Andrew: Nice.

Joanna: …you’re going to be on swim team and you’re going to be a winner. So I guess that lit the fire in me from early on. I was a backstroker through college. My coach who swims next to me, in the lane next to me, gets on me about just naturally backstroking all the time and he’s like, “We don’t backstroke in the races.” But I think if I could choose, we would. So ultimately collegiate cheerleading won out over swimming. So that ended my collegiate swimming, but I created the Tri for Him Youth Team in 2011 in Houston and that’s how I started coaching kids and I had to kind of develop a specific system or method to teaching kids proper stroke form.

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: Then also getting them acclimated to open water swimming which is scary. It’s scary for kids and adults. So, also in Pearland, south of Houston, I created the master’s swim program which I ran for a couple of years and like Jeff, thousands of swim lessons, analysis. It’s been a lot of my coaching career and so I really enjoy it. I will say that with the pandemic a lot of that in person coaching has switched to virtual swim analysis, video swim analysis…

Andrew: Yeah I bet.

Joanna: …and creating drill plans for athletes, which it’s been really a blessing because I think that a lot of athletes are benefiting from Jeff and I’s help. Even though we can’t be in person, we can help them virtually.

Andrew: Yeah, so both of you do those kind of swim stroke analysis sessions with your coached athletes. Sometimes those are in person if someone lives near you, but like you just said, sometimes those are over video. So Jeff, when you partner with an athlete to do a swim stroke analysis, what is that process like?

Jeff: Well, first I totally agree with Coach Jo as she was saying we do a lot of remote swim analysis now just because of coaching athletes abroad or not immediate in our cities, but also COVID and stuff like that. I try to do the best I can with remote analysis doing it through a video feed so I can show them things and stuff like that if we’re not in person. I start off with an initial consult. You know, a conversation, talk about this athlete. What is their story? What is their background? What are their goals? What is their next big A race coming up? Stuff like that. Just like a bike fit, there are certain ranges that are textbook, we’ll say, for hip angle and knee angle and all sorts of stuff, but depending on your flexibility, your unique story, background, goals, and stuff like that where you fall in those ranges depends on your story and your background and stuff like that. So I start off with that initial consult. Then if it’s a remote, I will have them record themselves, and we chat about instruction there, and if they have an underwater camera great– more bonus footage. But the initial filming, the initial one even if it’s only above the water I have them film at multiple speeds and ideally an effort or pace of what they’re going to hold maybe in their next A race coming up. But I like multiple angles. A side view where the camera is following along the hip of that athlete on that side view and then a separate video a head view swimming towards the camera. Sometimes underwater if you have a GoPro or access to something like that. Then I’ll analyze that. I analyze that footage. I’ll take a few days, a week even, and I take my time with that. I’ll use a third-party app and there’s a number of good ones out there, but I’ll slow-mo. I’ll play it forward and back, forward and back, forward and back. Slow motion, I take screenshots of that, I draw angles, sometimes I can include a voiceover onto that and just really take my time and break down that stroke. I might even take 5 to 10 segments or pictures of those screenshots, draw the angles and all of that good stuff and then I’ll send that info or those screenshots back to the athlete with additional resources that I’ve created. But, I’ll then finally kind of schedule a final consult where we’ll do a screenshare and I walk through their pictures. I’ll even leave the screenshare and go to a video where I’m showing athletes things myself, demonstrations as well, because some learn by hearing, learn by seeing, learn by doing and so I try to cover all of those when we do that consult walking through their film.

Andrew: Yeah, no. It totally makes sense. Coach Jo, what is this process like with your athletes?

Joanna: Very, very similar to what Jeff has been talking about. A lot of the swimmers and athletes from TriDot that come to me are very apprehensive, very fearful of swim stroke refinement, of the process, of drilling. They’re fearful so they aren’t doing the drilling. So I think it comes probably from me teaching kids for so long that I try to break down their stroke and this is whether I am watching them in person or whether I’m looking at videos, the same angles that Jeff talked about are perfect. But I try to break their stroke down into seven parts and work with them on each of those parts individually. It doesn’t seem so overwhelming when we do it in that fashion. I do agree with Jeff that every swimmer comes to you with a different stroke and it has to be very personalized and one set of drills that work for one athlete are not going to work for another. So we have to be very intentional in how we analyze their videos and very specific as to pointing out deficiencies in their stroke and then creating a personalized drill plan that’s going to address those deficiencies so that they can see some results and overall not be overwhelmed with the process. To feel like it is an easy process and that they are going to be productive and that they are going to improve. So I think Jeff and I have a very similar approach to the virtual coaching and I think that that has been very helpful for lots of athletes.

Andrew: No, I can imagine it would be. I think there’s just an intimidation factor of just the fact that like when you’re doing run drills and you’re doing those bike spin ups and stuff, you’re on dry land. You’re in your element. We all grow up running. We all grow up playing. We all grow up running around and when you’re in the pool and you didn’t grow up on swim team, you didn’t grow up doing these swim drills, and you’re learning them as an adult it’s such a foreign land and then it’s a foreign land where you’re underwater and you have to turn to take a breath and some people aren’t as good at that as others. I mean, totally, you’re absolutely right, Jo. It’s just totally an intimidating thing when you come to swim as an adult. All of a sudden you’re trying to do these drills and you feel ridiculous. You probably look ridiculous.

Joanna: Exactly. You know I often find that exactly what you said is that we all ran at some point in life. We’ve all walked and ran. But a lot of adults have not swam and not swam specifically freestyle and come to me with a lot of embarrassment. So you know, we welcome them with open arms. Even my elite swimmers that need improvement, I let them know that we’re often starting over when we’re building a really good strong, efficient freestyle and that’s whether you’re…

Andrew: Interesting.

Joanna: …a beginning swimmer or a more advanced swimmer. When it comes to triathlon it’s a different stroke and when it comes to open water it’s a different stroke.

Andrew: No, very interesting. So when you both are working with triathletes, you see their stroke whether it’s in person, whether it’s over video, what are the most common stroke deficiencies you see with the athletes you work with?

Jeff: Yeah good question. Kind of to go back to what you guys were talking about, just having the buoyancy factor of the water and it just being a little bit different than walking or running and this goes hand in hand with stroke deficiencies. I explain to new swimmers especially that there’s kind of a fourth dimension in swimming that there isn’t in biking or running. So just being present is kind of that first dimension. The second dimension is laying flat on the water; laying down. The third dimension is the body roll side to side, but then there’s a fourth dimension of the catch, right? In grabbing that water and the timing of all four of those together and that’s kind of what I elude to is that fourth dimension and I think that is what is that unique factor that you don’t have just going forward on the bike, forward on the run. But some common deficiencies, number one, hands down I would say, is not being relaxed in the water. Fighting the water. 80 to 90% of our weight is taken against gravity due to the buoyancy of water so how to be relaxed involves a good recovery, good hand entry, hip rotation, and the timing of that. So we see a lot of high stroke rates and high heart rates, but slow speed due to trying to fight the water, not being relaxed. I’d say kind of the next tier of that is poor body positioning, body alignment. Body positioning kind of being that second dimension and then alignment kind of being that third dimension I talked about just a second ago. But then the head position, right? And it all involves being intentional and to do all that and have that good body positioning. There are things that you’ve heard out there in the swim world called maybe tautness, maybe front quadrant style. You know your kick is more so for good body positioning than propulsion. It’s a little different for triathlon in long course and open water than it is swimming. In the swimming world Brendan Hansen used to always say that in the swim world that the best swimmers are the best kickers or the fastest swimmers are the fastest kickers. But a long distance swim in the swim world is maybe a 200. You know, we have 4200 yards right?

Andrew: Yeah.

Jeff: And so there’s a difference, right? But that may include body positioning, body alignment may include maybe crossing the midline out in front with your catch which is usually entering too early or maybe too close to the face. Maybe some poorly timed body roll which can cause drifting to one side or the other in open water. Too great of a body roll on the breathing side is what we see. You might have this huge great body roll when you take a breath and then maybe a non-existent body roll on the non-breathing side because we want to rush the stroke and hurry up and get that salvation. That rest. That air. So those are key things we see. Lastly we see maybe poor timing of the stroke and we’ll talk about this later on I’m sure, but the underwater phases of the stroke each have their own timing of that and you have to be intentional through that. So we want to kind of start off slow setting it up, finish fast. You may have heard the “grip it and then rip it” or “grip it and rip it.” So most beginner swimmers tend to lose the timing the most when they take a breath or when their face is coming out of the water to take a breath most to tend to maybe drop that lead arm too fast or too early into the stroke or maybe they’re pressing too hard and too fast so all that water is going around and away from their forearm and they’re not catching it and pulling it as efficiently. So there’s just tons of things that we can really break down, but there’s a method to the madness for sure.

Joanna: You know, like I mentioned before a lot of athletes do not have exposure to proper swim instruction as kids and swimming and swim terminology can feel like a foreign language. Even the thought of correcting swim form or deficiencies in the swim stroke can cause major anxiety. I find that isolating and addressing each stroke issue individually is essential and I often, I think this comes from me teaching kids throughout my coaching career, putting it into layman terms and using a lot of visual cues or references is very helpful because I can explain something to them, I can even show a drill to them and they don’t understand the purpose or what that’s supposed to look like when they do it. So most common problems I see in swim stroke are an athlete’s ability to continue to exhale throughout the stroke.

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: Why are we holding our breath? That is a major problem that most triathletes have. We’re nervous. We’re anxious. Whether we’re getting in the pool, whether we’re getting in the lake our first instinct is to hold our breath.

Andrew: And you don’t think about it until someone points it out to you that you’re even doing it.

Joanna: No. You hold your breath and your heart rate skyrockets.

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: The second thing I find is that head position, body position in the water, how do we get level? How do we get flat? Why are we swimming with our head out of the water like a doggy paddle? There I often see lack of hip rotation. That’s a big one. A lack of torso rotation in the water. Very flat swimming feels very normal until we point it out to an athlete and then they realize that is something they’re supposed to be doing. Keeping a high elbow, recovery phase. This is very hard for a lot of athletes. We see a lot of high handers, a lot of windmilling and so working with athletes on achieving a high elbow and keeping it through the recovery and catch phase. Then I often yell at my athletes, “Quit with the monster kick! What is going on? Why? You are not Michael Phelps. Stop kicking like a madman.”

Andrew: You are not going 50 yards or 200 yards.

Joanna: 50 yards and you know, why do we want to use those big quad muscles? They take up a lot of oxygen. Let’s get that kick in check. A few other ones are keeping pressure against the forearm. I’d say find your paddle. We’re not pulling with just our hands. We need to be feeling that pressure against the forearm and that’s a very foreign concept. Once an athlete gets that sensation of that pressure against the forearm it’s kind of an aha moment that we’re going to be pulling three times the amount of water under our body versus just the amount that fits in our hand.

Andrew: Sure.

Joanna: You know and then one of the last things that we all do, and I do it myself, we get lazy, we get tired, and we crank that neck. We have that deliberate head turn and learning to be a more natural breather in the water. If we’ve got sufficient rotation in the water our face is there. We have access to breathe. So those are just a few of the areas that I try to work with each athlete. There is a priority. There is a list that we start in the beginning, some of the simpler parts of the stroke and then we work our way down to some of the more complex areas.

Andrew: Yeah, we’ll talk in just a moment about how to fix some of those specific problems or how to even diagnose within yourself that you have some of those specific problems, but first I remember when I first came to tri, just swim terminology was a foreign language to me and Jo you just said that. That was so true for me. I relate to it. So I’d see articles on social media or from Triathlete Magazine and they would be like, “6 drills to improve your recovery phase.” or “how to establish a good catch.” and I literally was like Googling the terms to learn what the different parts of the stroke were and what different drills could do to fix them. So just to help folks listening who might be newer like I was then. Talk to us about the different parts of the stroke and what the arm and body are supposed to be doing each phase.

Jeff: Absolutely. You know, I alluded to there are four different dimensions while swimming and body positioning, but I would also argue there are four main strokes and each phase of the stroke means something. So I would argue there are three underwater stages or phases and then there’s one above water and that would be the revolution of one arm. Those four stages being the catch phase, the power phase or that diagonal middle phase, and then the finish phase. Those are the three underwater and then the above water is that fourth stage, the recovery. So for the stroke to be effective, there’s a lot that goes into setting up the first phase. Let’s just say I have an hour conversation walking through somebody’s swim analysis film or screenshots. I would say the first 30 minutes of that 60 minutes is just talking about setting up for the first phase which is that catch phase. But to set up that catch phase properly, we have to have a good entry position in the water. We don’t want to enter too close to our forehead with that recovery arm, but we don’t want to enter too reached out or too straight to where that elbow is kind of entering the surface of the water before the fingertips. But when our face comes back in the water off of a breath we should still see that lead arm out in front. When the recovery arm is coming forward and about to enter into the front, the front quadrant, we should still see that front lead arm underwater. So a lot of people press down too hard and too fast to kind of lift their head up and turn and take a breath.

Andrew: Yeah. Yep, absolutely.

Jeff: And when the face comes back in the water that underwater arm is already down by the pocket or the lower rib cage or something like that. So that’s something–

Joanna: And Jeff, that reminds me of the archer drill. Thinking of that position, when I try to explain that positioning in the water of you know your arm that’s in the recovery phase, the other arm is extended still out there not dropped down too far. If you can give them a visual cue of that archer position they’re like aha! They get that sensation. So that’s a good drill to emphasize that.

Jeff: Absolutely.

Andrew: Yeah.

Jeff: I use that drill a ton with my athletes. So once we kind of have that understood or that perfected, then what we want to do is the reach. So with an arm at full extension and we’re kind of setting up the catch. It’s underwater, it’s entered not too close to our face or too far. We want to reach out at full extension, but we don’t want to pop that hand back up to the surface. I call that the high five or the wave. We don’t want to wave at somebody at the other end of the pool. We want to catch the water and we want to start that initial twitch of the high anchored elbow, catch, we want that hand to be at a point that is lower than the wrist and the wrist is lower than the elbow and the elbow is lower than the shoulder. So the start of the catch phase is very strategic. It’s patient. We’re setting it up. We’re catching the water slowly. Like JoJo said earlier, we want to catch the water with a paddle. So we want to think elbow to fingertips. As we’ve caught the water, we’re pulling it towards our face. We’re not pressing too hard and too fast because we don’t want all that water to go around and away from our forearm. We’ve got to take that water that we’ve caught, we’ve got to pull it towards our faces, our chests, and then as we start to progress the speed, increase the speed, we want to start thinking about where we throw that water. We want to throw that water eventually down to the bullseye; which if the circle is drawn around our feet, we’re going to eventually engage the triceps, the finish phase of the stroke, push that water with a hyperextended wrist all the way down to our feet. So that’s kind of the idea. Then lastly the recovery stage, most people tend to– once they’ve pressed the water down to that bullseye, they’ve engaged their triceps and they’re ready to bring the arm above the water, I call it the salute, but a lot of people will immediately throw the fingertips forward and then the fingertips cross the plane of the ear, the head, and progress into the front quadrant. The fingers first, then the wrist, then the elbow, and then they reach out and kind of gently lay their arm down on the surface of the water. So all that is a no-no. We don’t want to do the salute. We want to lead with that elbow. Once we press the water, the elbow is kind of leading us forward and the lower arm is relaxed. JoJo talked about that windmill or that arm just being thrown up to the ceiling of the gym or natatorium. We want to keep the lower arm a limp noodle and we’re kind of leading the recovery arm forward. We’re pulling forward with that high elbow and the lower arm is relaxed. I promote or coach a slightly wider recovery arm for most. We want to have a high elbow and we want to lead with that elbow, but if we’re just squeezing our shoulder blades and really tense and tight, we’re not getting recovery. We want gravity to drop that arm down into the surface of the water out into that front quadrant. You do that reach and then all of a sudden your arm, right, your wrist is lower than the elbow, the elbow is lower than the shoulder, you’re out in the front quadrant, you’re ready to start your catch phase and just when your arm stops that downward momentum due to the buoyancy of the water, you got this awesome chunk of rest and then all of a sudden your arm, hand, all these things happen to be in the perfect start of the catch phase and you’re ready to do it all over again and you got a huge hunk of rest in there. That’s the idea of that recovery stage.

Joanna: I concur with Jeff on breaking down freestyle into the four phases. I’m going to give a few simple, simple summaries of each of those just to kind of concur with him as well as a few visuals that I give some of my athletes in simple terms. Catch: Entry of that paddle into the water. Make yourself look at your arm.

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: Look at that fingertip to elbow. What do you mean by catch? I mean that paddle is going to powerfully enter the water. Where is it going to enter the water? We drive at 10 and 2, we enter at 11 and 1. I’d like to see those paddles enter at 11 and 1. #2 This is super silly. I’ve even made adults do it. How is that hand going to enter the water? It’s going to enter like your hand entering a mail slot on a door.

Andrew: Sure.

Joanna: I used to make kids stand at my front door and put their hand through the mail slot. I’ve made a grown man stand at my front door and put his hand through the mail slot.

Andrew: Okay.

Joanna: A couple of visuals because a lot of times we do see that dropped elbow and we see people slap the water. We see that whole paddle– elbow, armpit, hand– all making contact with water at the same time. We’ve got to get that elbow up. So in leading onto what Jeff was talking about as more of our power phase, more of our diagonal phase, where are you feeling that pressure against the arm? How do we get that feeling? How do we keep that feeling? My two favorites are– because I love backstroke– I often make my athletes alternate four or five strokes backstroke, turn over four or five strokes freestyle. You feel the pressure against your forearm. You feel that power. You feel that pull tenfold in backstroke as compared to freestyle.

Andrew: Yeah. It’s so true.

Joanna: So when I can get them to– the brain to have that moment…

Andrew: To feel that. Yeah.

Joanna: …and feel it, they’re going to search for that feeling the rest of the time they’re doing freestyle. Second thing–

Andrew: Jo I like the dog paddle drill for that reason.

Joanna: Dog paddle is wonderful. In doing that you feel that force against the forearm.

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: Another one I like to do, but I modify it a little bit, you know fist drill. Oh, everybody and their mother has done fist drill.

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: But try doing four strokes fist closed, four strokes hand open. Alternate back and forth.

Andrew: And see the difference.

Joanna: That’s when people really go “Aha! I feel that pressure against my forearm and I’m going to try to keep it when I open my hand.”

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: Those are a couple little tricks of the trade. Finishing I absolutely love Jeff’s reference of really let’s sling that water, let’s push that water to the bullseye. We need a feeling. We need to see that bullseye toward our feet and sling that water. That’s where the power comes in. And lastly with recovery, I think a lot of my athletes struggle with different arm lengths, different body types. What does that high elbow look like for different people? I don’t limit it to “hey you need to have a 90 degree bend in the arm.” I like how Jeff says he coaches a little wider arm location for that recovery. I like to say, “Hey, let’s look for a good rainbow arch” for some athletes because that’s more how they’re shaped. Or my arms are as long as Michael Jordan’s so I’m like, “yeah, I can get a great bend in the arm.” So everybody has different limb lengths and we have to accommodate that and we’ve got to use different references for different athletes. But yes, concur with Jeff. The four phases are very, very important to isolate and work on each individually.

Andrew: So knowing there’s those four phases and knowing kind of some of the deficiencies you guys identified earlier in the conversation that triathletes struggle with. With swim form, there’s kind of a certain hierarchy or to put it in math terms, there’s an order of operations if you will, for improving your form. It’s not an exact step-by-step per se. Before some examples there is very little point in looking on your catch if you haven’t established proper body position because you’re just teaching yourself to pull better and you’re just pulling your legs or you’re just pulling extra drag. Or there’s not really a whole lot of point in focusing on bilateral breathing; it’s going to go a whole lot better once you’ve improved your body rotation. So each of you have worked with swimmers enough to kind of have your own flow for how you help them break down and improve their stroke and I want to hear just both of your approaches. They’re similar, they’re inline with each other for sure. They’re just different ways to help athletes think about it. So Jeff, what is your approach to swim improvement?

Jeff: There’s definitely a method to the madness and the hierarchy that you’re referring to, absolutely. First of all I’ll say, I’ll give a swim analysis to somebody and whether they’re a 2:30 per 100 yard kind of a base swimmer or they’re a 1:15. So whether they’re a stud or maybe they’re a beginner, when I give swim analysis there’s always something for everybody to work on and I think sometimes towards the end of those analysis calls people are kind of crosseyed and are like, “Oh my goodness! I have so many things to fix or correct. Jeff just gave me 12 different things.”

Andrew: Yeah. Where do you start?

Jeff: “Where do I start?” Or “Man, I thought I was a decent swimmer. Gosh, I’m horrible.” So I’ll say that first of all you’ve got to pick one or two things. Focus on those first. If you try to fix everything in one week or one month or your first session after an analysis. You’re all pumped up. Okay, great. I’ve got to go work on these things and you try to go fix everything you are going to be so frustrated.

Andrew: Yeah.

Jeff: If you pick one or two things then usually once you fix those the other four, five, six, seven, eight let’s say things sometimes in turn automatically fix themselves. But the hierarchy really is the body positioning first. We can’t fight the water. We have to be one with the water. We have to be relaxed in the water. We have to have good body position. We can’t drag and parachute through the water. We’ve got to be long through the water. So athletes first kind of tend to need to be more fundamental. So I might coach like a lower stroke rate, a bigger body roll, being longer in the water, super kind of like a tap and go style, super front quadrant style of swimming just so people are calm, cold, and collected. They’re slowing the stroke rate down. They’re staying longer– think of your vessel. Think of a boat or a ship. The longer that that ship is the easier when it gains speed, right, it rises to the surface of the water when it gains speed, right? It’s more efficient. So a lot of times we’ve got to take a step back to take a bigger step forward later on. So I’ll say we’re going to have a very low stroke rate, very fundamental super tap and go style. Stay long. Keep your vessel very, very long and let’s focus on the timing of the body roll. Not letting those legs drag and then over time we might slightly increase the stroke rate. For my elite swimmers I may have them cut their body roll in half so that they can increase the stroke rate, but there’s a method and a way to do that safely and that’s way down the line. So to kind of bring it all together, really focusing on the body positioning first; the body balancing. Then the body alignment, rolling into that third dimension. Then once we’ve got a good timing of the stroke, then we focus on perfecting each phase of that underwater stroke with the timing. So body positioning is definitely, definitely first and foremost. That’s got to be perfected and a lot of people try to rush it. They try to focus on the recovery or the finish or incorporating a kick in there, but if you don’t have that body positioning kind of perfected or comfortable first, you’re going to plateau. I mean, I see it all the time. It’s not that hard to make a swimmer from a 2:30 base per 100 down to a 2:05 or something like that. But if you’re ever going to swim a 1:30 based 100 pace for a half IRONMAN swim in open water let’s say, there’s a point at which you’re going to have to take a step back and really focus on those more fundamental body positioning aspects first and then the rest after that.

Andrew: Yeah. As you were talking, Jeff, about just the body position I was thinking back to when I was doing my USAT, USA Triathlon, level 1 triathlon coaching course. It was hosted at Arizona State University and so when we were at the pool having the Arizona State Sun Devils coach kind of show how he coaches his collegiate triathletes in triathlon, he had a couple of them giving a demonstration in the pool, and he showed us. Often, I mean these are collegiate level triathletes, strong swimmers, strong in all three aspects of the sport, and he will have them do drills where they’re just floating on the top of the water just to reinforce that body position and right at the start of every single season that’s where they start back in the pool every single year is reinforcing that floating. Reinforcing that keeping the body long and relaxed when they’re on top of the water. So interesting to hear you say that that’s the most important thing for us to start with. So, Jo, how do you break down swim improvement with your athletes?

Joanna: Adding on to what Jeff is talking about as far as breaking down swim improvement, going through each phase of the stroke, as important is the dryland work that we do as far as improving our swim stroke. For most of my swimmers that come to me for full swim analysis, really wanting to improve their stroke, the most common deficiency I see is a lack of core strength. This affects their run, their bike, their swim. So I assign some serious homework when it comes to that core strength…

Andrew: Great.

Joanna: …and that’s often five to seven plank sessions a week. Repeat…

Andrew: Wow.

Joanna: …five to seven plank sessions a week. What I find is I’ll ask them while we’re on the phone, while we’re Zooming, I want them to get in a side plank position. This is engaging the exact muscle groups, deep transabdominal muscle groups that we are using when we swim as far as rotation, trying to engage hip rotation, but it’s also super important for us as runners and cyclists. So I tell them, get a good TV show on. Get those planks going on. Follow it with window washers. Do it with your kids. It’s work that can be done very easily over a five to ten minute period versus an hour session at the pool can make a huge difference. Also being a yogi fanatic I talk a lot about flexibility. Because we spend so much time in aero position on the bike and only doing freestyle for most triathletes, our posture is very affected detrimentally and doing a lot of chest openers, back openers as far as yoga positions– Yes, dance it out Andrew. As far as doing a lot of those practices can be super beneficial. So I yell out camel pose, eagle pose. Take your foam roller. One of my favorites is to have athletes– I’m like I know you watch TV at night. Take that foam roller, lay it vertically on the ground along your spine and just open up that chest. Put those arms at a T. Put those arms like a cactus position and stay there for ten minutes and…

Andrew: Wow.

Joanna: …then the next day they’ll be like, “Wow I feel a huge difference as far as chest being opened up.” You’ll also feel a difference in your next swim session.

Jeff: So my foam roller needs to be next to my living room TV so during commercials of the NFL playoffs I will be doing planks and yoga poses and foam rolling every commercial.

Joanna: Yeah and you know, I will tell you this and believe me or not, my kids have never watched a TV show with me or a movie where I have not been on the yoga mat or working with a foam roller, massage gun. They just wish for five minutes their mom could be normal. That’s the life of an IRONMAN athlete.

Andrew: Yeah so if an athlete listening to this hour and change long podcast takes anything away I want it to be just kind of that order of operations that Jeff kind of mentioned that Jo then agreed with. You know, focus on your body position, your body alignment, and focus on your rotation etcetera, etcetera, and then take Jo’s strength work and mobility, flexibility, yoga work to heart. Because if you just on your own accord start doing those two things it’s going to go a long way for sure. But after hearing all of that for the typical triathlete who’s at home, how much improvement can we expect to make on our own and what are some tips for kind of self-diagnosing where we’re at and what we need to work on first at self-improving?

Joanna: You know, I say this to my athletes. Swimming is 100% form. Repeat after me. Swimming is 100% form.

Andrew: Swimming is 100% form.

Joanna: Swimming is 100% form.

Andrew: 100% form.

Joanna: So what do most athletes do knowing that? They go to the pool, they go to the lake, they rarely drill, they rarely work on swim form.

Andrew: It’s so true.

Joanna: They go out. I’m supposed to swim one hour. I go swim one hour. I didn’t do one drill. I never worked on my swim form. Repeat, swimming is 100% form. So first steps. Diagnosing weaknesses, deficiencies in the stroke. Two fold: Go get a swim analysis. Get a personalized drill plan. Do the homework assigned. If that’s not in the cards, video yourself. Look for problem areas.

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: A lot of times you know what that recovery is supposed to look like or what that hand entry is supposed to look like. Research the drills online that address those issues and start doing the work. Repeat.

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: Do the work. I tell my athletes they know one of my constant slogans on the team is “Drill, drill, drill.” and that comes to running. That comes to swimming. I tell them weaknesses, problems in your stroke are not going to magically correct themselves. You’re not going to do a bunch of interval speed work. You’re not going to do all your threshold work and wow! Now your stroke is perfect. It’s just not going to happen. You know, a lot of times athletes will say, “Well if I add an extra session to the week– if I swim 15,000 meters this week will I become a better swimmer?” And I tell them weaknesses will not magically correct themselves if you swim 5,000 yards three times a week.

Andrew: Yep.

Joanna: They’re not going to go away. So progress and improvement is made by drilling and strength work. Those two things. Drilling and strength work. So side note– a little interesting question I got this week from an athlete and it kind of took me back for a second when she asked me because she was being so open and transparent when she asked me and I love when athletes come to me with a question like that because they’re being their real selves.

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: She said to me. She said, “I just don’t have the normal swimmer’s body type and I’m kind of embarrassed about that and is there any hope for me?” And I was like, “Whoa. Aha.”

Andrew: Wow.

Joanna: And I had to think about it for a minute and I said, “Let me explain something to you. First of all I came to triathlon, I came to IRONMAN with a four month old baby, a two year old, and a five year old and that’s when I hit IRONMAN for the first time.”

Andrew: Wow.

Joanna: Okay, so when I talk to people about not having a swimmer’s body or not having a strong powerful cyclist’s body I explain to people, yes I was blessed by my parents with the physique of a lanky 14 year old boy body. That makes for me to be a good swimmer. It’s always come easy for me and I work with so many athletes that struggle with swimming and say it’s so unnatural for them. But what I tell them as far as advice is this– for years I’ve watched girls fly by me on the bike. Power past me. They’ve got powerful legs that can crank out all these watts on the bike. I’ve never been able to push power that way, but what I do do is I work my intervals. I work them harder than anyone on any given day and I work on my aero position, my positioning on the bike. I do everything I can to make me a better cyclist, to make me a faster cyclist. So what I say to them is no excuses. None.

Andrew: Yeah.

Joanna: If you do the work, you will continue to improve. Even if you are an elite swimmer on TriDot if you do more work you will continue to improve. So to answer my athlete’s question about is there hope. Girl, there’s always hope. You can always be a better swimmer. You can always be a better triathlete.

Andrew: Yeah and all any of us can do is the best that we can do with the body we’ve been given. You know, we all have different shapes, sizes that are going to limit themselves to different pros and cons and at the end of the day there’s no point in lamenting what you’ve got and the tools you’ve got. It’s just like you said, putting in the work and learning how to do the best you can with what you’ve been given and everybody can be a triathlete. Everybody can be a good swimmer. Everybody can be a good cyclist. You just might have to work a little harder than somebody else.

Joanna: And the beauty of it is you have tons of room for gains. Tons of room for improvement so you have those great days. Every time you do an assessment and you’ve made big gains. For super strong elite swimmers they don’t see big jumps. They don’t see big jumps in those assessments. So I tell them to keep their chin up and do the drilling, work hard, do the dryland work and they’re going to see improvements in their stroke.

Jeff: I am amazed at how many people go years and years without seeing real footage of themselves swimming. How do you self-diagnose? “Hey, maybe in two months I can afford to go get a swim analysis or meet with that person or whatever, but what can I do between now and then?” Film yourself. Jo said it. Coach JoJo said it. Film yourself. Try to self-diagnose and even if you can’t. “I don’t have that expertise.” At least film yourself. Everyone at least knows they have that one weird issue. I know my right arm does that one weird thing. Everyone knows that or maybe you’ve been swimming with a master’s team or a coach on deck for years or months and they’ve told you that and you know it, but until you see yourself actually doing it sometimes it doesn’t really click or become a priority to fix. Or you think you’ve fixed it. “Oh, I’ve only 5% fixed it.” You feel like you’re doing it right.

Andrew: Yeah.

Jeff: So see yourself doing it. Get that footage whether it’s from a real analysis or a coach on deck or you just film yourself and go home, but see yourself swimming and do it at least every month. At least.

Andrew: I would say the most helpful thing is to partner with a coach, get a swim analysis with somebody who is knowledgeable. But like you said Jo, if that’s not in the cards, if that’s not in the budget, I mean I’ve seen people get that footage of themselves and then throw it out to the I AM TriDot Facebook group. Now know if you do that you’re probably going to get some different responses and some different opinions on what you should fix first and what the order of operations should be, but you might have to sort through a little bit just because every swimmer has a different background and they could all be knowledgeable swimmers that just were taught a different way. But that is an option for you. You could also get that footage of yourself and take from earlier in this episode where Jeff Raines gave like a five minute breakdown of exactly how a swim stroke should play out and he talked about the catch phase and the this phase and the that phase and the recovery. You know, listen to that chunk of this podcast episode while looking at the footage of yourself and look at the arm angles he’s talking about and look at the different parts of the stroke as you’re doing it to how he is coaching it and you can get kind of a good idea of what you probably need to start with just between this podcast and some footage of yourself. So great feedback there guys.

So I’ve heard a lot of triathletes express that they’ll see a breakthrough or an improvement in the pool only to see their swim pace remain the same once they reach the open water. What can we do to ensure that the stroke improvements we make in the pool translates to the open water?

Joanna: I’ve got a lot to say on this one, sorry Jeff. Sorry Andrew.

Andrew: Bring it.

Joanna: I was thinking about his analogy when I was driving over here, but for me it’s let...

...spend as much time as we can on our trainer, on our bike inside. Let’s get as comfortable as we can. Let’s do all our time on the trainer and then let’s go outside and race on a gravel bike and never have been outside on a bike before. And this is the same concept I have as far as let’s do all our swimming in the pool. Let’s work on that stroke. Let’s drill. Let’s get to be a fantastic, efficient, comfortable swimmer in the water and then let’s go race in a lake in a wetsuit. It is completely foreign to us. So when I work with athletes, I’ve had a number of women that I’ve helped that were pretty good swimmers, pretty comfortable in the water, wouldn’t get off the dock at the lake.

Andrew: Wow.

Joanna: So what do we do? It’s exposure. The only answer is exposure. It has to become our norm. So when I say we are super relaxed and comfortable in the pool because we are there all the time. OWS is foreign to most athletes starting out. #1 it’s not accessible all months of the year so even athletes that are comfortable in the water we just don’t get as much exposure to open water. So what do we need to do? We need to get in that open water. I prescribe to my athletes in the months leading up to an endurance race, half or full IRONMAN, both those swims or two out of three need to be in the open water. You can drill in the open water. There are some that are easier versus some drilling, but all of the work that you do in the pool can be done in the lake. You know, we don’t do it because we’re uncomfortable because it takes us out of our–

Andrew: It’s not as easy. It takes more time.

Joanna: It does. It takes us out of our comfort zone.

Andrew: You need to have other people with you probably.

Joanna: But we also need to be in those wetsuits. That is a totally different aspect to swimming. I do it myself. I hate wearing a wetsuit. I am so comfortable just wearing my swimsuit and then I get out in a race and I’ve got to do a full IRONMAN and do 2.4 miles in a full wetsuit. Totally different environment. That should be my norm. I should have practiced that many, many, many times. So that’s my 2 cents on it. I do tell my athletes to repeat exposure, repetition, comfortable. When you get out there in open water and you can obtain that sense of being extremely comfortable out there, then you can get the mental focus. You can work on the stroke out there, but if you are anxious and overwhelmed when you are in open water there is no way that you’re going to be able to focus on your stroke.

Andrew: Now you each have a healthy roster of coached athletes who I know you do some swim work with, but if folks listening today really want to make an investment in their swim form this season, how can they get connected with you or another TriDot coach to get some eyes on their swim form?

Jeff: Well first of all I would get connected with TriDot. I would get connected with a TriDot coach. I would put your day-to-day, week-to-week triathlon training, your optimized triathlon training– the drills that are prescribed in TriDot are not random. TriDot looks at your swim data, looks at each workout and it prescribes strategically certain swim drills. If you’re an over swinger or an “over-reacher” or something like that, TriDot sees that, it flags it, it knows it, and what it does is it prescribes certain, particular, very strategic swim drills in your daily swim sessions to try to make you become a better swimmer. So simply just doing your TriDot training and not skipping those swim drills first of all, that’s the first step. Know that that is there for a reason and do the drills every time when you warm up and cool down that you see on your prescribed TriDot sessions. Then second, get with a TriDot coach. Somebody that can look at that data, understand it, and take it to the next level, right? If that’s not in the cards. If those fees or maybe working with a coach one on one is just not available at this time due to financial reason, then what I would do is reach out to your local master’s swim group and see what they do, just a one time swim analysis or something like that or at least get with a buddy to film you and start there. Then you can send that footage to somebody remotely like JoJo or myself.

Joanna: Yes, Jeff. I think there’s a couple of great opportunities that are popping up over the next couple of months. If you are interested in a swim analysis or personalized drill plan there are a number of TriDot coaches that can help you with that. Feel free to contact me under Facebook Messenger or you can always DM me under Instagram @coachjotridot. I do post a lot of tips and technique work under my Instagram so feel free to follow me if you choose.

Andrew: A lot of tips and a lot of Betty kits as well.

Joanna: A lot of fashionable Betty wear at the same time. In addition I am also planning a couple of swim clinics in February. They will be near the Houston area. I’m doing this in conjunction with our new TriDot coach Kyle Stone and so those camps will take place in February. We are also discussing an open water swim camp over two days. Again that will be near south Houston where I live, but you guys will get more information about that over the next couple of weeks.

Cool down theme: Great set everyone! Let’s cool down.

Andrew: We had a swim related warm up question, a swim related main set, so let’s finish today strong with a swim related cool down. This is a segment that I like to call, “Gear We Use” where we find out what specific gear items our coaches use in their training and racing. So Jeff, Jo, when it comes to your swim training, what are the maybe three or four items that you use in training that make the biggest difference for you. And Jo, I’ll have you go first.

Joanna: Caffeine.

Andrew: Umm. Hallelujah.

Joanna: Lots of caffeine. Love my Speedo paddles, various buoys, very fashionable Betty swimwear, more caffeine, and I am about to try the Form Goggles. I’m excited about that.

Andrew: Oh, cool.

Joanna: I want to give that a shot and I also will be sporting a new Vanquish wetsuit from the Betty Elite Squad sponsor Zone 3. Yay. So those are all in the works for my training for the two world championships.

Andrew: Very cool. I, just this past year, switched to Arena Goggles. I played goggle roulette for a long time and Jo you and I actually raced IRONMAN Waco in the same–

Joanna: Love, love, love, love the Arena goggles.

Andrew: –pair of goggles. Yep and so I’m using their pool ones as well. I did try Magic 5 last year. That was the only one I tried that I really, really liked. I like them better in open water than I do in the pool, me personally.

Joanna: Agreed. Yep.

Andrew: So I’ve been using Arena goggles and then I really like the Finis hand paddles. The yellow ones that don’t have a strap. It’s kind of like you guys were talking about. Just to know in your catch and pull– if you don’t set up the catch and pull correctly wearing those, there’s no strap on them and so that paddle will not stay on your hand the way it’s supposed to…

Joanna: They're tough.

Andrew: …if you’re not doing that. So I like that just because it keeps me honest and it makes sure when I’m doing paddle work that I’m setting up that catch and pull correctly because you can’t cheat with those paddles on. The third thing for me, I’ve talked about it on the podcast before, I just absolutely love and geek out over my two piece DeSoto Wetsuit and like you guys said, I mean getting– To me part of getting used to and comfortable in open water is loving your wetsuit, being comfortable in your wetsuit, having a good fitting wetsuit, and me and that wetsuit we just get along so well. So gotta give a shoutout to my DeSoto Sport two piece T1 wetsuit. Jeff Raines, what about you?

Jeff: You know, it’s preseason and arguably TriDot fans, TriDot athletes are in developmental so we’re updating those bike fits in this preseason, we’re getting new gear, trying new things. Getting an updated swim analysis, right? So I just got the new custom Magic 5 goggles and I love them. No leaking.

Andrew: Very nice.

Jeff: So really excited about those. Second, I like long fins when I use fins. Then with paddles I actually don’t recommend using the bottom strap on the wrist. It can teach bad habits. So really being intentional with the type of paddles that you buy. I love the reverse mag lock zipper on my Rocket Science Aqua Sense. It’s called the Aqua Sense wetsuit. It’s just one motion. The zipper is inverted from arguably every other wetsuit out there. So you grab that string right behind your neck and you just pull up and in that same motion you peel it over your shoulder so you don’t have to grab it or do all these extra movements. I love that reverse mag lock zipper.

Andrew: Well that’s it for today folks. I want to thank Coach Jeff Raines and Coach Joanna Nami for teaching us so much about the swim stroke. Huge thanks to deltaG for partnering with us on today’s episode. To learn more about the performance boosting benefits of deltaG ketones head to deltagketones.com and use code TRIDOT20 for 20% off your order. Have any triathlon questions or topics you want to hear us talk about? Head to tridot.com/podcast to let us know what you’re thinking. We’ll have a new show coming your way soon. Until then, Happy Training!

Outro: Thanks for joining us. Make sure to subscribe and share the TriDot podcast with your triathlon crew. For more great tri content and community, connect with us on Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram. Ready to optimize your training? Head to TriDot.com and start your free trial today! TriDot – the obvious and automatic choice for triathlon training.

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