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22 JAN 2026

Do you feel like you swim, like, a lot, but you rarely see any kind of improvement in the pool or in your open-water swim times?

You are NOT alone. If you came to swimming as what I call an "adult-onset swimmer" it can be very hard to develop the technique and the engine and mindset for effective swimming.

I'm not going to tell you to "never swim more than a 25 until you can swim it perfectly," because a) perfect doesn't exist and b) if you do that you'll never develop enough specific endurance to hold that "perfection" longer than a 25.

Proper swim development requires focusing on all three slices of the Swim Smooth pie:

Training is fairly obvious: it's stuff like endurance, threshold, and speed sets, and this is where most triathletes spend 90% of their time, giving both technique and open water the short shrift. If I hear another triathlete say "I'll just do volume until my technique improves" I'll just hurt their shoulder right then and there and save them the wasted time before they blow out a rotator cuff.

You DO need to focus on technique, but I get it: very few people tell you how to do it correctly, there are dozens of conflicting opinions on YouTube, and if you don't know what a particular drill is supposed to do you are VERY unlikely to do it (this is a classic "Just trust the process" moment that leaves athletes frustrated and fuming).

But before we get into actual technique work, let's talk about the big three areas that hold swimmers back.

Drag

Yeah, this one literally holds swimmers back, and there are dozens of ways you might be creating more drag than you need to be:

• You won't wear jammers or (gasp) briefs when you swim, so you are putting a parachute on your body. Ladies, you're exempt from this one due to centuries of unfair costuming expectations, and dudes? Get over it.
• You might be lifting your head to breathe, which pushes your legs down behind you
• You might be holding your breath, which lifts your torso and pushes your legs down behind you
• You might be pushing down with your hands and arms during the catch-and-pull, which...pushes your legs down behind you
• You might crossover at the front of the stroke or over-rotate due to only breathing on one side (put up your hand, honestly, if you breathe only to one side), which will cause your legs to scissor behind you like a parachute

This is only a small sampling of ways swimmers create unnecessary drag, and if you come to the free webinar I'm hosting Monday (details below) you'll learn a lot more

Lack of Propulsion

If you don't take water from in front of you and push it behind you, you won't make enough propulsion to overcome your drag. Examples include (but are not limited to):

• Pushing water down at the front of the stroke
• Straight arm catch-and-pull
• Focusing on kick instead of your catch-and-pull
• Lack of proper core engagement
• Stroke rate too high or too low
• Losing the "front-quadrant" part of your stroke
• Catch-and-pull is too shallow or too deep

Again, just a sampling. You know the call to action!

NOT DYING

Yeah you read that right, but seriously: swimming is the only part of a triathlon in which you compete in a medium that can kill you. We are upright, bipedal mammals who extract oxygen from air. When we swim we are horizontal, quadripedal mammals who cannot extract oxygen from water. Even if you are a seasoned swimmer evolution has coded alarm signals into your nervous system about being underwater.

How do we not die? By turning our bodies to where the air is so we can breathe.

And what happens when we do that?

We forget that we're swimming, because not dying is a higher priority than swimming effectively.

In all my years of doing this, I know now that the thing that messes with your stroke?

It very likely happens when you are breathing/not dying.

Paying attention to what's happening when you go to breathe is a HUGE part of swimming correctly. You might be:

• Breathing only to one side which unbalances your stroke
• Lifting your head to breathe
• Crossing over the centerline because of your breathing mechanics
• Holding your breath due to anxiety
• And many more breathing-related issues

Want to learn how to deal with this? Pauses for audience participation.

You got it! Come to the FREE Webinar.,

WE HAVE A SUBSTACK!

Yes! Finally. We'll still be announcing events and what not over here, while publishing chapters of THE BOOK I AM WRITING about balancing the physical, intellectual, and emotional cornerstones of effective training and racing. It is totally free for now, but later in the year when I start publishing the "Plan" part of the book I will be paywalling those options. If you're one of my one-to-one athletes, though, you get it all for free.

I'd love to see you over there.

As always, thanks for reading.

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Presented by Campfire Endurance Coaching

Today's newsletter is presented by Campfire Endurance Coaching.

We help endurance athletes improve their results (get FASTER), find more joy in the process of getting faster (get HAPPIER), and achieve lifelong wellbeing through sport (get HEALTHIER).

Our company has two major services:

• ​One-to-One Coaching: fully customizable, high-touch coaching built for your life and your goals. Our coaches carry a maximum of 15 athletes so you know you and your goals are always a prioity.
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If any of those sound like something you would like to take advantage of, you should consider booking a 45-minute FREE coaching and training consultation with us​