The US Swim Team's Secret Weapon, Science

Hugh Pickens writes "When American Swimmer Margaret Hoelzer goes for the gold tonight in the 200-meter backstroke, part of her success will be due to a new system developed by Tim Wei, a mechanical and aerospace engineer at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, that uses fluid dynamics to study human movement allowing scientists and coaches to study how fast and hard a swimmer pushes the water as he moves through it. 'Wei uses a tracking technique called digital particle image velocimetry, commonly used to measure the flow of small particles around an airplane or small fish or crustaceans in water.' Wei filtered compressed air in a scuba tank through a porous hose to create bubbles about a tenth of a millimeter in diameter. When an athlete swims through a sheet of bubbles that rises from the pool floor, a camera captures their flow around the swimmer's body and the images show the direction and speed of the bubbles, which Wei then translates into the swimmer's thrust using software that he wrote."

Comments

Changing is easier said then done.

[BitterOldGUy]

Swim coach Sean Hutchison, who put two athletes on the Olympic swim team, says that he used Wei's insights as the basis for every technical change he made with swimmers leading up to the Olympic trials and games this year.

After doing something for years and years, changing the way you do something, whether it's a swimming stroke or tennis or golf swing, isn't done instantly. It takes quite a bit of concerted effort and attention to change it. I'd be really interested in how and what the coach does to get the swimmers to change.

I've witnessed swimmers in college that have bad habits that they gained as youth and they can't seam to shake them.

Re:Changing is easier said then done.

[Crispy Critters]

That depends. I remember reading about Natalie Coughlin four years ago, and one of the coaches was describing how Natalie could take a suggestion and instantly integrate it into her swim style, even in a competition. I believe that ability was seen as unique.

It is plausible that adaptability is one trait that helped the Olympic swimmers become Olympic swimmers in the first place. Certainly it would be interesting to hear more about it.

Re:Changing is easier said then done.

[Original Replica]

I have to wonder if Olympic swimmers know their sport so well, as to be able to be consciously aware of all the tiny little adjustments that help make the difference. I know that the more cycling I do the more aware I am of my pedal cadence and how smooth (or not) my pedal stroke is. An Olympics swimmer spends so much time thinking about their swimming I should hope that they can consciously add finesse where novices like me have trouble not swallowing pool water every fourth stroke.

Re:Changing is easier said then done.

[Alomex]

I've witnessed swimmers in college that have bad habits that they gained as youth and they can't seam to shake them.

About twenty years ago, famous golf swing coach Butch Harmon saw Tiger at a day camp for kids. At the end of the day he knew Tiger would be famous one day but not because of the way he hit the ball. It was because of the way he took direction and coaching advice. Butch said that over the years he had seen quite a few kids hit the ball better than Tiger, but none so eagerly seek advice and apply it on the field as Tiger did.

It's not just American athletes that are faster

[iamghetto]

Everyone is faster in the pool. I watched a race where even the 5th place finisher came in above the old world record time.

Just read this: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/12/sports/olympics/12records.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Over above whatever the swimmers are using, the pool itself is engineered to create faster times. Everything from the lane dividers, to the wall of the pool, to the extra meter of depth are meant to dissipate turbulence in the water and increase times.

Re:The secret science is wrong

[icegreentea]

And his body. He's like a dolphin. His proportions are perfect for swimming. And then he's double jointed in his ankles, elbows, shoulders AND chest. His armspan is 10cm greater than his height. All he needs now are gills.

Re:It's not just technique

[garcia]

Everyone has known about this for years and I'm not quite sure why it's suddenly news now. There are plenty of pools out there that have 10+ lanes (in college we had 10+ lanes and we swam in the deep end of the pool for SCY races). It really seems like most of the discussions about the reasons for the WRs falling are more or less just to fill the time that the announcers have between events.

I realize that the general public doesn't understand how pools, suits, and training methods have evolved over the last 15 years but it's seriously not news worthy IMO. US Swimming is just trying to get people to pay attention to how cool swimming is so that they get the most out of the "Olympic Cycle". The "Olympic Cycle" is the phenomenon that occurs following every Olympic year where swim teams see a upswing in the number of youngsters trying out for swim teams because of all the coverage ("ohh, Mommy, I want to be Michael Phelps/Natalie Coughlin/Hall Jr/Krazelburg/Dolan/etc too!")

Another flash in the pan caused by mass media dumbing everything down to a mostly unaware public. Move along.

Re:Related research on the dolphin kick Phelps use

[hkgroove]

That's why you can only dolphin kick for 15 meters now.

In 25 yard pools during backstroke it was easier to dolphin kick and swim 8 yards with the last 2 dedicated to the turn.

As for swimming underwater: Most sprinters in the 50m freestyle don't take a breath during the race. In short course (25m pool) 50m races I maybe took one breath on the way back - depends how much air I released during my turn. If I swam at the right speed I could get about 75m before needing to come up and take another breath. But this was far from racing speed.

Re:Maybe they're just more adaptive

[dbcad7]

Pro golfers often take lessons almost as if they were beginners.. It's easy for a golfer to develop bad habits and relearning the proper techniques is what makes them good.. Most amateur golfers perhaps take lessons when first learning the game, and that's it.. If you learned the game, and played every day without any further instruction you would play fairly well, but if you retake lessons occasionally and play every day you will get so much better.