Chad Dillon, the head coach of Boilermaker Aquatics, realizes the importance of doing a lot of kick during swim practices with his swimmers.
Here are a couple swim sets that he uses with his swimmers in order to help develop some of that lower body power and endurance that comes in handy when his athletes step up on the blocks later on in the season.
The next time you are at the pool give one of them a try and work your way to developing a faster, more powerful freestyle kick.
Take it away Coach Dillon!
Kicking It with Boilermaker Aquatics
We do a lot of kicking at Boilermaker Aquatics. And everybody does a lot. We focus on kicking technique in the middle of the season, and we build/maintain kicking endurance and body position throughout the entire year.
Below are a couple sets that focus on kicking endurance.
Set #1
I use this first set a lot with our Seniors early in the season. I don’t like using intervals here (yet) because there are days in the early season when athletes aren’t recovering well or maybe they’ve had a bad day.
So the PACE is specific to their capacity of that particular day.
But, everyone is expected to negative split the set and finish faster than they were going on the 50’s. Go a couple rounds, and athletes start looking more confident about their conditioning (small goals achieved make big gains).
4 x 50 Kick @ :10 Rest (Determine your average PACE per 50)
2 x 100 Kick @ :10 Rest (2 x(PACE) – :05)
Set #2
We also do a team test set which is focused on kicking endurance and a little bit of competition. Every athlete on our team completes 400 yard flutter kick with a kick-board once per month.
Most of the time we partner athletes together to count laps, keep track of time, and cheer for their partner during this set.
It’s a great event every time we do it, and the athletes have made it a great competition and benchmark of how they are maintaining their kicking skills.
We’ve got a public record of these results at one of our practice locations.
1 x 400 Flutter Kick w/ Kickboard For Time (Record time with Coach)
Thank you to Coach Dillon for stopping by to share these sets with the community. You can stay up to date with the Boilermakers by following them on Twitter and on their website.
More Info on Improving Your Kick:
- 3 Drills for a Faster Freestyle Kick. Want to level up your kick? Here are three drills for you freestylers out there to improve your flutter kick.
- How to Build an Awesome Underwater Dolphin Kick. Our flagship guide, which includes tips from Olympians, elite coaches, and biomechanists, will teach you everything you need to know about mastering the fifth stroke.
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