Tips, Tricks and Support If You Sink When Swimming Front Crawl

Swimming teachers are commonly asked about sinking and floating and why it does or does not happen to a person.

Hi, Mark here. I hope all is well with you.

This week I am answering a question I was asked about sinking when swimming front crawl. Scroll down and you will find links to my awesome front crawl resources. My ebook for beginners to improve and some drills and a 'how to teach' guide for swimming teachers.

I received a message online that went like this:

I find myself sinking when swimming front crawl. I'm able to float and manage some decent distance with push glide and leg action alone. But the moment I start the arm action for front crawl, invariably, the legs sink, and I come to a stop. What is going wrong? How do I overcome this?

My answer:

"The problem with your front crawl could be down to several different reasons or a combination of them.

If you are achieving some distance from a push and glide and kicking, then your body position must be somewhere near correct, and you must be reasonably efficient through the water in that position. Therefore, we can deduce that your body position and efficiency are being compromised when you introduce an arm action into your movement.

The most common reason for this is excessive movement of the head and sometimes the shoulders, and this compromises overall efficiency which could then cause the legs to slow and sink.

To combat this, you could try a 'catch up' exercise, either holding a kickboard or with your hands together, whereby you keep your hands or the kickboard out in front of you and begin your push and glide and kicking action. You then begin to pull with one arm at a time, holding the kickboard or joining hands between arm pulls, where one arm is not allowed to pull until the other has caught up, hence the term 'catch-up'.

This exercise will force you to use your arms but keep your head and shoulders still, maintain the correct body position, and hopefully stay afloat!

Another possible reason for your legs sinking is your coordination. You are kicking quite happily and reasonably quickly, maybe, and then the instant you introduce the arm action, your legs kick slower and at the same pace as your arm pulls.

In other words, you switch from a possible four-beat cycle to a one-beat timing cycle the moment you begin pulling with your arms. The reason for this could be purely down to your coordination and your ability (or lack of it) to kick your legs quicker whilst using your arms slowly. The catch-up exercise described above will help with this too."