Finding Your Stroke: A Better Way to Swim in 2026
Dear Swimmers
As we approach the end of another year, it feels like a good moment to pause briefly and say thank you. Thank you for reading, questioning, challenging, and engaging with our content throughout 2025. The quality of the questions we receive, both online and poolside, continues to push us as coaches and keeps Swim Smooth evolving in the right direction. With Christmas just around the corner, this feels like the perfect time to reflect and look ahead.
One theme that has surfaced repeatedly this year is the pursuit of “efficiency”, and more specifically, the misconception that efficiency equals gliding, pausing, or taking fewer strokes at all costs. It’s an idea that looks appealing on YouTube and in slow-motion demonstrations, but often proves frustrating and limiting for real swimmers in real conditions
When Looking Smooth Becomes Swimming Slow
Water rewards momentum. Every time you pause or exaggerate a glide in an attempt to look smoother, you lose speed and make the next stroke harder than it needs to be. Re-accelerating your body after each pause costs more energy than maintaining forward flow. What appears to be “effortless” swimming from the side of the pool is almost always continuous, connected movement beneath the surface, not passive gliding.
Even the world’s best swimmers do not pause at the front of the stroke. What looks like glide is actually connection: a firm hold on the water and immediate intent, allowing the body to move forward over an anchored arm.
Three Simple Things to Try Over the Festive Period
If you do manage to sneak in a relaxed swim between Christmas and New Year, here are three simple experiments to try.
1. Keep the stroke moving
On an easy continuous swim, focus on removing any conscious pause at the front of the stroke. Think “catch and go”, rather than “reach, wait, pull”. The goal is not to spin faster, but to feel uninterrupted rhythm from one stroke to the next.
2. Compare feel, not stroke count
Swim two lengths at the same steady pace. On the first, try to take fewer strokes. On the second, allow yourself a slightly quicker arm rhythm. Ask yourself which length feels smoother, more controlled, and easier to sustain. Efficiency is about repeatability, not winning a stroke-count contest.
3. Notice when effort creeps in
As fatigue builds, do you start pausing more at the front to “rest”? That’s often a sign that timing, not fitness, is the limiter. Simply keeping the hands moving can reduce strain and restore flow, even at the same pace.
Coaching the Swimmer, Not the Stroke
This is what we believe 2026 should be about: finding your stroke. Not copying someone else’s. Not chasing arbitrary numbers. True efficiency is individual, adaptable, and robust enough to hold together when you’re tired or swimming outside the pool.
Working with a Swim Smooth Coach gives you the structure, feedback, and reassurance to develop a stroke that works for you. It remains the surest path to meaningful, lasting improvement.
Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and a happy, healthy New Year. We look forward to helping you find your stroke in 2026.
Get swimming. Your Coach, Paul
