How To Swim The Side Stroke

The side stroke is an old swimming stroke swum on the side. It is not used in swimming competitions and therefore it is swum less often.

Because the side stroke uses different movements for each side of the body, it looks odd the first time you see it. Nevertheless it has its advantages and can be interesting to learn.

Swimming Video

The following video demonstrates the sidestroke:

Sidestroke Swimming Technique

Body Position

The initial body position has the swimmer lying on the side. The legs are extended. The lower arm is extended to the front in the water, the upper arm rests flat on the side of the body.

The body essentially maintains this side-lying position the whole time. The swimmer may roll from one side to the other when he is tired.

Head

In side stroke it is best to keep the head aligned with the spine and slightly rotated upwards, so that one side of the face is in the water while the other side clears the water. The swimmer can then easily breathe and has good visibility to the side.

A variant is to slightly lift the head above the water for additional visibility and better breathing, but this can strain the neck and is unnecessary if the swimmer has good balance.

Arm and Hand Movements

Initially, the lower arm is extended to the front with the hand perpendicular to the bottom of the pool. The upper arm rests on the swimmer's side.

Now the arms execute the following simultaneous motions:

• The lower arm bends at the elbow, pushes back against the water and makes an insweep until the hand is a few inches in front of the chest with the palm turned upwards. During this phase the lower arm provides propulsion.
• Simultaneously, the upper arm is bent and slides forward until its hand is above the other hand, both palms facing each other with the upper arm's palm turned downwards.
• After this the lower arm extends back to the front while the upper arm pushes against the water in a backward sweep until it also has recovered its initial position.
• The cycle starts anew.

An apple picking analogy is often used to explain the arm motions in a simple way:

• The lower leading arm picks the apple, the upper arm rests on the side of the body.
• The hands are brought together at the chest and the apple is passed from the lower hand to the upper hand.
• The hands part and move back to their initial position, the upper hand throwing the apple away.
• The cycle starts anew.

Scissor Kick

The legs do a simultaneous and asymmetrical motion known as the scissor kick. Let's imagine that initially, both legs are extended. At the start of the cycle, the legs spread:

• The upper leg bends, the knee is brought towards the chest and the foot follows along.
• The lower leg bends and the foot moves towards the buttocks.

At a certain moment, the legs don't spread any further. The propulsive phase starts:

• The legs extend, push against the water and are brought back together to their initial position.
• During this time the feet execute opposite semi-circular motions.

Finally, a short glide phase occurs where the legs (and arms) don't move before the cycle starts again. To summarize, the legs do the following motions:

• Bend and spread in opposite directions.
• Extend and squeeze back together.
• Glide.

Arms and Legs Coordination

To synchronize the arm and leg motions, you should visualize that the upper arm and upper knee both move forward at the same time, then also push or kick back at the same time. The other arm and leg simply move simultaneously in opposite directions as previously described.

Breathing

In the side stroke you typically start to exhale when the arms part and continue to do so until the glide phase ends. You subsequently inhale when the arms move towards each other to meet at the chest.

Advantages

The side stroke has the following advantages and uses:

• It is useful for relaxed long-distance swimming. As it is swum on the side, both arms and both legs move at the same time but asymmetrically. As a consequence, different muscles work and tire on each side of the body. This allows the swimmer to roll over to another side when he is tired swimming on the first side.
• It is useful for lifeguards to rescue victims. For this the lifeguard holds the victim with his upper arm against his chest and hip, while he can still swim with the lower arm and kick with the legs.
• It can be a welcome alternative to the four competitive swimming strokes that are swum all the time.

Shortcomings

The sidestroke has also its shortcomings:

• It can't be used in competitions: it isn't allowed in any event except the freestyle, and in that event it isn't fast enough to compete with the front crawl.
• The swimmer doesn't see where he is headed to as the face is turned sideways. However, to alleviate this problem, you can switch sides each few strokes and take a quick glance to the front while switching.

Learning The Side Stroke

• Learn how to swim the sidestroke contains progressive dry land and water exercises to learn this swim stroke.