Introduction To Our Intermediate Swim Classes
Ocean First Jun 26, 2022
Here at Ocean First, our Intermediate class is a combination of Intermediate I and II. The goal of this class is to establish the foundations of competitive swimming that your swimmer can take with them to our Advanced classes. We focus on technique while also building strength and endurance. A good way to build endurance is to work towards lap swimming. Unlike our Beginner classes, our Intermediate swimmers are now working towards swimming a few consecutive laps without stopping.
Intermediate I focuses mainly on breaking down freestyle by transitioning from windmill arms taught in our Beginner levels into a more competitive form. This is an important step so we spend a lot of time helping them work on perfecting this stroke.
Freestyle is the competitive name for a single arm over water recovery. The swimmer will begin in a streamline position and then pull one arm straight down by their legs like the windmill arms taught in the Beginner levels. The arm comes out of the water in a bent arm recovery as the body rotates and both arms reach as far as possible. The arm motions should be in a smooth cycle continuously moving without hesitation. Freestyle also incorporates the side breath as a transition from rollover breath. The swimmer should roll to the side with their ear on that same shoulder and kick while catching a breath, then roll back. The goal is to roll to their side to breathe and no longer their back. Swimmers get comfortable learning side breath to one side, which is also called unilateral breathing.
Intermediate I also focus on elementary backstroke which is a preliminary stroke that transitions later into breastroke. Elementary backstroke is done by laying on your back and combining Tickle, T, Touch with the arms (done in Beginner I-III) and Bend, Out, Together with the legs. We want them to get comfortable swimming on their back while also learning the basic movements of breaststroke that will be taught in the Advanced classes.
Intermediate II focuses on freestyle with bilateral breathing which is breathing every three arm strokes rather than unilateral breathing on the same side. This improves endurance as they will need to hold their breath longer. Intermediate II transitions from elementary backstroke to competitive backstroke. This is done similar to freestyle but on the back. The arm will come straight out of the water with the thumb pointing up, and then turn to enter the water with pinky going in first. After passing Intermediate II, the swimmer should be comfortable with competitive freestyle and backstroke and they will be ready for Advanced I and II!
As in all of our classes we also work on dives, flipturns, treading water, and having a little bit of fun!