Swim for a Mile
News and Articles

For most of you week 11 is here and we are getting closer and closer to Swim for a Mile 2019!

We hope that you have enjoyed everything that the Swim for a Mile program has thrown at you. We have loved every week and clinic that has passed, and hope that you have too.

We very are grateful for the coaches and sports partnerships who have encouraged and supported participants throughout the program over the last 11 weeks. Use these last couple of weeks to get yourself in the zone and ready for your event!

Reminder:

You’ll notice in week 11 you have a half distance (400m or 800m) time trial, use this to update your Estimated Completion Time (ECT) for the event. Your overall event time is likely to be double the time trial time plus 2-3 minutes.

You can do this by logging into your SFAM dashboard and clicking ‘Change’ under ‘Challenge Registration’. Your ECT time is important because it ensures you are swimming with people of similar ability on the day.

To get the most of your time trial here are some land warm-up exercises you can do before getting in the pool. These exercises will gradually warm you up, raise your heart rate and prepare your body for movement in the pool. This land warm-up can be done before training sessions and the timed event.

Land Warm up:

• 5 Single arm circles – 5 backwards, then 5 forwards
• 5 Double arm circles – 5 backwards, then 5 forwards
• 5 Alternating arm swings – hand begins at your hips and finishes by touching down behind your neck
• 6 Head tilts – straight posture, bring left ear down to left shoulder and back to middle / right ear down to right shoulder and back to middle
• 5 Hamstring Walkouts – fold at the hips and move forward into a plank position, then walk your hands back as close to your feet as you can, back to the starting standing position
• 5 Lunges – step forward into lunge, making sure your knees do not go over your toes
• 10 Squats – stance wider than hip distance apart, to activate your lower body and help with kicking technique

‘Master your mind, and defy the odds’ – David Goggins

 

The Swim Ireland Corporate Relay Challenge is back for another great year! Now is the chance to grab your colleagues and set out for an afternoon of fun at the Sport Ireland National Aquatic Centre on Friday the 29th of March!

This year the challenge has been revamped to include more relays of shorter distance, to give everyone the opportunity to show off their swimming skills! The day will run from 12:30 – 16:00, arrival time is 12:30 for check-in, briefing and warm-up, with racing commencing at 13:00.

The Challenge will include four relays:

1. 4 x 50m Kick Relay
2. 4 x 50m Swim Relay with equipment of choice.
3. 4 x 50m Partner Swim Relay – Towing a colleague!
4. 8 x 50m Finale!

Each relay must include a minimum of four swimmers. Teams are allowed up to 8 swimmers in the Partner Swim and Finale Relay. You can also switch teams between relays to play to everyone’s strengths! Each organisation can enter as many relay teams as they wish!

Each relay will carry points, the team at the end, with the most points will be crowned the ‘2019 Corporate Challenge Champions!’

After the races, we will have refreshments and the awarding of the ‘Corporate Challenge Cup’ Attendees are welcome to stick around after the challenge to watch our Irish Open SwimmingChampionships, which commence at 5pm. Ireland’s elite swimmers will be taking to the pool, aiming to qualify for this summer’s international meets including: World Championships, World University Games, Junior Europeans and European Youth Olympics.

Team entry price is €100 with 50% going to our Official Charity Partner – Temple Street Children’s Hospital, if you would like to donate further to this fantastic charity, you can do so HERE!

So what are you waiting for? Grab a team and get entered!

For further information, please contact Bethany at swimforamile@swimireland.ie

Each year Swim for a Mile (SFAM) nominates a charitable organisation in a bid to assist them in raising awareness about their work and also champion them in their fund-raising efforts.

This year is no different, we are delighted to announce Temple Street Children’s Hospital as our charity partner for 2019. Every participant who registers for the 2019 Swim for a Mile challenge will support this fantastic hospital in the work that they do.

Over 147,000 sick children from all over Ireland are treated each year in Temple Street. The hospital has some of the best doctors and nurses in the world, but without specialist equipment and facilities it’s simply not enough. Every year Temple Street rely on the support and generosity of people like our SFAM’ers to help raise €5 million. These funds are crucial and allow them to redevelop hospital wards, fund vital lifesaving equipment, services and invest in research.

10% of every Swim for a Mile registration will go to Temple Street Children’s Hospital. YOU can raise further funds for Temple Street with your miracle mile, by clicking & sharing the iDonate Link or by requesting a sponsorship card from us at Swim for a Mile.

The Swim For a Mile team, along with Irish National Record Holder Darragh Greene, paid a visit to Temple Street this week. We were blown away by the enthusiasm of the staff and it was truly an eye-opening experience to see these inspiring children, parents and medical professionals.

We are asking each of our SFAM participants to target a goal amount to raise from the list below:

• €10 will buy a syringe, essential for administering pain relief to a sick child
• €15 will go towards multi-sensory toys which are specially adapted to aid rehabilitation
• €20 will buy four special neonatal masks – small enough to fit a newborn baby’s face
• €50 will go towards the cost of an operating microscope.

Whether you are an avid fitness fan or can only swim two lengths, grab a friend to help champion change to make this hospital a better place – Ireland’s little ones deserve nothing less.

After our first round of Swim For a Mile 2019 Technique Clinics, we thought we would put together a few technique tips on areas that we focused on last weekend! Hopefully, this will refresh the minds of those of who attended and fill everyone else in! #Tricksofthetrade

Body Position Tips:

Any elevation of the upper body causes your lower body to sink. The aim is to keep as flat on the water surface as possible. To do this:

• Apply constant pressure with your chest (not head!) into the water, pushing towards the floor – imagine you are trying to swim downhill!
• Always perform trickle breathing (letting your air out slowly) when your face is in the water, this will ensure your lungs aren’t so full that your upper body floats.
• Keep head movements to a minimum when you breathe, so that you’re are rotating your head to the side rather than lifting it up – remember the one goggle rule: aim to keep one goggle in the water when you rotate to breathe, if you can see the ceiling when you breathe – you’re lifting your head too high!

Freestyle Kick Tips:

• You never stop kicking when swimming Freestyle and Backstroke, even when swimming slowly!
• Focus on keeping your knees and ankles close together, kicking from your hips and bum rather than your knees.
• Kicks should be small and fast, check out our kick demo for a better idea!

Recovery Phase Tips – High Elbows!

• Elbows stay high during the recovery phase of the stroke to prepare for the catch, you need a high elbow during the catch in order to grip the water effectively. Finger trail / tickles drill is good for reinforcing high elbows!
• To keep a high elbow during the catch, imagine your elbows are pinned to the water surface!
• As you begin the underwater pull phase, imagine your forearm as the paddle, a higher elbow exposes more of your forearm, which increases the surface area of your paddle, helping you push against the water to go forward!

Sculling Tips:

Sculling replicates the catch motion. To find your hand shape during scull, place your hands on your cheeks and then take them off holding that position, you will notice that they are slightly cupped – these are your sculling / catching hands!

• Your hands guide the movement, finger-tips must point down to move forward (and up to move backwards).
• Keep your wrists stiff while sculling and catching- you can’t grip any water with floppy wrists! To point your finger-tips down, raise your elbows (pin them to the water surface!)
• Your forearms do most of the work; palms should alternate from facing in and out, wrists stay stiff and the forearms grip the water. Check out our sculling demo!

Whatever stage you’re at with your Swim for a Mile training, we’re with you every stroke of the way! To help in these early stages we’ve put together some descriptions and technique tips for training, so you can make the most of your Swim for a Mile journey!

Description of the 4 Phases of a Freestyle Stroke

Hand Entry:
Your hand should enter in line with your shoulder to prevent crossing over your centre line – this is an imaginary line down the middle of your body, which you should never cross! The reason we stay outside of the centre line, is to ensure that all of your energy is going into moving forward. If you cross the centre line, you are apply force to the side, meaning the propoluson you receive will be to the opposite side, creating that well known snake motioned stroke. We want to push back to go forwards!

Catch:
This occurs immediately after your hand enters the water. The catch is basically a small scull pushing into the water, however it is called the catch, as you are literally trying to catch or grab the water to use the resistance to push you forward during the underwater pull. This is one of the rare occasions where we want to have water resistance!

Underwater Pull:
This can be further broken down into the initial downward phase and the latter backwards phase. Initially you want to push your palm and forearm down into the water WHILE keeping your elbow at the surface, creating a “high elbow catch”, this position allows for greater surface area, in which to grip the water. Once your hand passes the line of your chest, you begin to rotate your body in the direction of your stroke arm, keeping your hand close to your trunk, explosively push past your hip until your hand exists the water.

Recovery:
The recovery, as suggested by its name is the relaxed part of the stroke! Its purpose is to get your hand from the exit position back to its entry position. All you have to remember is to keep your elbow high in the air, pointing to the ceiling WHILE your hand stays directly below and close to your body. This ensures that your hand is in the perfect position, ready for the catch. Full Stroke Freestyle Demo Video!