Head Position in Freestyle Swimming for Triathlon

Dear,

I just did an underwater video swim clinic last weekend and came across an issue with head position in freestyle that seems to be more common than I thought.

The typical problem with head position is that the swimmer looks forward instead of looking down. The second most common problem is a head that moves around. The head should be still and focused on the pool bottom during freestyle swimming, keeping the back of the head at the surface of the water, only moving along with hips and shoulders to get air on a breath.

The new issue I saw with a couple of the triathletes was their chin tucking in a little too much. Be careful with this! I think what has happened is that many coaches have hammered this notion of “head down” so much into our heads that it’s easy to overcompensate, and actually tuck the chin into the chest (which will create drag as you swim).

By the way, if you think you can get a few people together and would be interested in me coming to your town to do a swim clinic with underwater video, let me know. I’m thinking about taking this a bit on the road, starting with California and neighboring states in the west.

Enjoy,
Kevin

Get excited and enthusiastic about your own dream. This excitement is like a forest fire – you can smell it, taste it, and see it from a mile away.”
-Denis Waitley

Triathlon freestyle from the ground up!

Stay tuned as the TriSwim Pro course is going to re-open here in the next couple of weeks!

Sincerely,

Kevin Koskella
Tri Swim Coach