How to Swim Like a Triathlete (Not a Swimmer)

Pool swimmers and triathletes alike embrace the swim workouts for their aerobic benefits, cardiovascular improvements and non-impact performance training. Their approaches to the sport, however, are often very different.

Long-time pool swimmers are very technique driven and are used to spending hours looking at the black line on the bottom of the pool. Many recreational triathletes, by contrast, came to swimming in their later years and are not always as familiar and comfortable in a group swim setting. They don't want to "get in the way" and will sometimes go to to lengths to simply swim laps on their own to avoid group workouts.

Casey Arendt is a USA Triathlon Level 1 Certified Coach, Olympic- and half-distance triathlete, time trial cyclist and life-long swim specialist who runs Go the Distance Coaching based in Austin, Texas. Here, she discusses some of these differences between pool swimmers and triathletes, along with tips on how triathletes can become better swimmers and learn to embrace what is often their weakest discipline.

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