Understand Why We Do The Drill, :
- Allows us to swim a straight line in open water
- Teaches us to be efficient through the movement, not losing power or increasing resistance as you take the sighting stroke.
How To Do It:
Body Position:
- Keep your hips and heels inline with your head as far as physically possible at all times through the sighting movement
The Movement:
- Pick one arm to sight off. It doesn’t matter if it is your left or right arm, but you want to make sure you always sight off one arm only.
- After 4-8 strokes, as your chosen arm enters the water, push your chin straight forward so your eyes break the surface and you can see the pool deck on the other side.
- Extend forward with that arm, lengthening your body while your eyes are up, looking for your sighting target.
- Once you have seen the pool deck (successfully identified the sighting target) bring your chin back down towards your chest moving your neck back into a neutral position.
- Breathe again on the 2nd stroke after you put your head back down. This will be the next time your chosen arm enters the water. For example if you have chosen to sight off your left arm the pattern will be:
Left hand enters, breathe, right hand enters, left hand enters, sight then head back down, right hand enters, left hand enters, breathe, right hand enters, left hand enters, sight then head back down, right hand enters, left hand enters, breathe. - Breathe as much as you need to in between sighting strokes, during the 4-8 strokes when your head is down and neck is relaxed.
- Repeat every 4-8 strokes through the length.
Things To Focus On:
- Your head must move from the relaxed, eyes down position to the forward position and back down in one up-down movement.
- Do not look forward off of a breath stroke and do not breathe on the very next stroke after looking forward.
- There must be one stroke after your breath before you push your chin forward and then one stroke after your head relaxes downwards before you breathe.
- Do not breathe while your eyes are looking forward. Only breathe during th strokes where your head is down.
- Lengthen and extend as you take the sighting stroke.
- Use the finish of your opposite hand to help maintain your momentum through the sighting stroke
- Put in a slightly harder kick as your head lifts up to help maintain your body line and stop your legs from sinking.
- Don’t lift up your head and shoulders to sight, push your chin forward just enough for your eyes to lock onto the sighting target.
