ABSTRACT
The purpose of this study was to quantitatively analyse New Zealand’s most elite breaststroke swimmers to learn more about the techniques being used and their variability among swimmers of Pan Pacific qualifying standard. Three male and three female New Zealand Pan Pacific Squad members who race in breaststroke and/or individual medley were requested to swim breaststroke at race pace. Two PAL video cameras simultaneously recorded the above and below water views from a position perpendicular to the line of travel of each swimmer. Paths of the shoulders, hips, knees, ankles, feet, center of mass, and trunk and thigh angles were obtained from the digitised records. Pull, kick, glide, and deadspace times, stroke length and stroke frequency, and center of mass velocity were calculated. Large differences among the swimmers were found in all of these variables and swimmers had their own characteristic profiles. In particular, there were large variations in stroke frequencies and stroke lengths, relative durations of the phases, and the amplitudes of vertical undulations of the joint centers and centers of mass. It was concluded that among elite New Zealand breaststrokers there was considerable variability in techniques.
