PDLC Swimming Skills

I’m currently working on my swimming skills using the PDLC approach by Joe Friel. See details about this swimming system here.

If you’re a Triathlete I really recommend Joe Friel’s book The Triathlete’s Training Bible and here is a link to a podcast where Joe discusses his swimming system with Brenton Ford.

Just a reminder: P – posture, D – direction, L – length and C – catch.

So here’s what a typical training session looks like for me atm, I have been training in the PDLC system for about 6 weeks now. Whilst perfprming the 25m drills be sure to completely recover after each length, for me that’s typically 2-3 minutes and I try to get to the pool three times a week.

• 200m warmup – no focus on anything just going easy
• 4x 25m Posture, focus on head straight down ( for me i need to really tuck my chin onto my chest to make this happen). I try to feel how my whole body is at the surface, just very easy little kicks
• 4x 25m Direction, Joe calls the drill the Penguin swim, arms out to the side as far as possible. I have found this more difficult than expected because the muscles I’m using are totally different in the should and I get fatigued pretty fast.
• 4x 25m Length, focus on hand up, body rotation, stretch as far as you can and feel the glide through the water
• 4x 25m Catch, focus on high hand and catching the water as soon as the hand enters the water.
• 4x 25m putting it all together

To finish I do:

• 2x 25m posture
• 2x 25m direction
• 2x 25m length
• 2x 25m catch
• 4x 25m putting it all together

Drills I use:

• Posture – point nose straight down to the line
• Direction – hands need to point in the direction you’re swimming, use penguin drill – arms as far out as possible
• Length – you need to feel narrow, like a speed boat – standing in the pool stretch up as far as you can and you’ll feel how you rotate, do the same when swimming, use the slap drill, reach as far as you can and slap your hand on the water with a fully extended arm, be aggressive
• Catch – when does it start – as soon as you hand points towards the rear pool wall! Use the windmill drill – keep your arms straight, do not bend at the elbow. Do this with a pull buoy and without.

To review how things are really going use the video, bring a mate along and simply video from above using your phone or if available use a under water camera. Do this as often as you can, maybe once a month.

All up about 1km, sometimes a bit less if I get to fatigued at the end I reduce the final sets to half.
The result for me to date I can’t really say because I don’t want to test until my next Tri, which is the Island Triathlon at Stockton, Newcastle. I’ve entered the standard distance for the first time since about 2015 or 16. I will post how it goes.