Swimmer's Daily

  • Geoffrey is a 2016 Olympian, influencer and first Hong Kong Male swimmer to win a heat at the Olympics and Gold on the Fina World Cup swimming circuit. He is an Asian Games Medalist and multi-time Hong Kong national record holder.

  • A time-honored tradition for high school seniors ended with two Granbury students dead from drowning. Now, those teenagers have been identified.

  • The next stop of the FINA/HOSA Marathon Swim World Series takes place in the unparalleled beauty of Seychelles. Be part of the next leg on 20th Ma yin Beau Vallon!

  • Many are the reasons why our work is no longer sustainable but in short our decision comes down to this:

    • the resources required for us to achieve our goals and deliver truly independent journalism, analysis and statistical services in swimming are simply not available
    • swimming and the priorities of a failing leadership that is not being held to account by key stakeholders, is sinking down the ranks of sports covered by the mainstream media and professional journalists far and wide. Swimming is among the sports being dropped as digital-era budget cuts and belt-tightening gather pace in the press; this, too, has an impact on the way we fund our work and justify our presence and time as journalists
    • swimming has become ever more a sport covered remotely; that’s no fun, nor does it lend itself to telling the stories that can only be told by being there, watching, listening, hearing, interacting, getting to know the swimmers and their coaches and sometimes their parents and families, too – and then relating human stories stacked with challenge, struggle, humour, achievement and setback. That’s how swimming used to be covered. It no longer is.

    Read here on SwimVortex.com

     

    Photo by Steve Snodgrass

  • U.S swimming legend Mark Spitz won seven gold medals at the 1972 Olympics in Munich – a record haul that stood for 36 years. Spitz – who is a three-time World Swimmer of the Year – reflects on how Michael Phelps’ eight-medal haul at the 2008 Beijing Olympics liberated both swimmers.

  • LEN President Paolo Barelli met Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban at Budapest in the Parliament. The meeting took place on the occasion of the FINA World Water Polo Conference when a delegation, led by FINA President Dr Julio C. Maglione, was welcomed by Hungary’s freshly re-elected leader.

    Mr Orban greeted Mr Barelli as a long-time friend since the LEN President, also a newly elected representative in the Italian Parliament, is a returning guest to PM’s Office where representatives of the aquatic sports showed up quite frequently in recent years. Consequently, Hungary hosted a series of outstanding events and there are a lot more to come in the near future.

    The first in the line is the LEN Congress on 2 June when, beyond the usual agenda, the National Federation’s delegates can meet the President of the European Parliament Antonio Tajani as LEN’s Special Guest and might learn details of the ‘Learn to swim, prevention for drowning’ programme which aims to reduce the number of drowning cases around the continent.

    During the meeting, Prime Minister Orban, President Barelli, Hungarian Swimming Federation President Sandor Wladar and Hungarian Water Polo Association President Denes Kemeny also discussed the plans for future aquatic competitions including the 2020 European Championships which would take place in the state-of-the-art Duna Arena, many considering the finest aquatic complex on Earth today.

    Press release from LEN

  • The Need

    No matter what your reasons are for playing a sport, something is for sure: it is healthy. Most of the people who have an active life exercise at least 3 times a week and each of them is choosing the sport that suits them best. Swimming, even though is known as one of the sports that are hard to be practiced and even harder to reach higher performance levels. But don’t panic as this article comes with 10 tips in order to improve your swimming skills especially aimed at beginners.

    The Tips

    1. Learn how to keep your goggles on for at least one hour. This requires no removing at all this time and it means that you should keep them on during the entire swim session. Warm up, the main set, kick or pull, and warm down will give you the chance to have little breaks when you could put them on your forehead, but what do you do if you will have a long distance race? Try to squint your eyes and let some water seep in. that water will prevent fogging your goggles.
    2. Practice sighting. While practicing in the pool try to look up on every fourth lap of the arm cycle. If you want to have this technique done perfect, you can ask for some guidance and suggestions from your trainer.
    3. When the hands are touching the water you should point the fingertips immediately straight down. This move should be followed by rolling your shoulder and pulling straight back.
    4. In order to avoid crossing one foot over the other, you should try using a pair of fins and start kicking efficiently while increasing ankle flexibility.
    5. Don’t be ashamed to use a snorkel. It will help you focus on the arm stroke and body rotation. This is a well-known practice among professionals.
    6. Take with you two pairs of goggles. You might need a dark set and a clear set. The dark one will be useful in the sunny days and the clear ones will come handy when there will be cloudy, foggy or rainy days. Also, alternate the goggles while practicing in order to get used to them both.
    7. If you train in cold waters then you should know that some of the people who do the same, use earplugs in order to limit irritation and prevent ear infections.
    8. A good item to have with you while preparing for the race or for practicing is a clean towel. It will help you clean your hands off Vaseline or wipe your goggles when needed.
    9. Follow the more experienced swimmers while they warm up before the race. You might get access to some tips and tricks and ‘steal’ from their know-how.
    10. If you’re participating in a race, make sure you get a good night sleep beforehand. If you’re not 100% fit before a swimming session or even a rookie race, your body will have a hard time adjusting to the effort required by swimming.

    flippers photo

    So, no matter if you are getting ready for a new triathlon, for a summer swimming contest of just for cooling off in the hot summer days , try to keep these tips in mind and you will improve your swimming technique for sure.

    Guest post by Kaya Johnson

  • FINA introduced the Mixed Duet in Artistic Swimming back in 2015. Since then, the two Italians Giorgio Minisini and Manila Flamini became one of the most popular pairs in the water.