The Effortless Swimming Podcast

Julie McDonald is one of Australia’s most celebrated Swimmers. She’s competed in 2 Commonwealth Games and 2 Olympics. Julie held the Commonwealth Record for the 800m freestyle for 21 years, the longest standing record for any Australian. Join me as Julie talks about her experience competing in the Olympics. 00:46 Exciting Swimming Events Going On 06:00 Is It All About The Gold? 10:10 Going To My First Olympic 13:08 Getting Your Head Into The Right Space 16:47 Olympic Flashback 19:52 Best Swim 22:17 Second Olympic Performance 27:39 Listen To Your Body 28:51 Using Logbooks 30:50 Hardest Week Of Training 34:43 Transition From Athlete to Working 39:51 Positive Mindset Is A Daily Activity 46:27 Consistency

Abe Goldberg has recently been through the 5-Day Catch Challenge. He knocked 7 seconds per hundred of his 1000 yeard time trial. I thought it would be great to get him on so that he can share what he changed about his stroke and about his swimming because I think it's going to be relevant to a wider audience and I am sure there's going to be some learning that people can take away from this and will apply it to their own swimming. 2:10 Open Recovery Versus High Elbow Recovery 4:10 Doing It Consistently 5:49 Being Mindful Of Front Quadrant 8:58 Using Bouyancy Shorts 11:46 Swimming Downhill 12:30 It's Okay To Come Up With Your Way Of Doing Things 14:50 Ongoing Commitment 17:07 Using Numbers

My guest today is Sam Laidlow who is considered one of the best triathletes in France today. He is born in the UK and was raised in French Pyrénées. Join us as Sam talks about his training, beliefs, and goals. 00:46 Working Hard And Working Smart 01:59 Dad As A Coach 03:39 Swimming 3X A Week 05:22 Big Part of Success In Swimming Is How Much You Enjoy It 06:06 There Is No One Way OF Swimming 08:18 Swimming With Stones 09:56 Strength Development 12:41 Go-To Sets 15:03 Should I Learn How To Flip Turn? 16:32 If You Don't Use It, You Will Certainly Lose It 17:47 Spending Too Much Time Running And Biking 19:16 Main Goals 22:38 Best Time 23:42 This Is What I Want To Do 27:29 Contact Sam Laidlow  

In this episode, I am chatting with Phil Rush, who has the fastest double and triple crossing of the English Channel. In this episode, we chat about a number of things including how can you get better at adapting to the cold, the type of training that you need to be doing if you are looking to do a marathon swimming, what are the important factors when you are thinking of the training that you are doing. Is it the distance that you are doing? Is it the speed? Feeding? What are some aspects of the training? If you are into open-water swimming, cold water swimming, or looking to increase the distance that you are doing, then this a podcast for you. 03:21 Successful Crossing Despite The Pandemic 4:13 Everybody's Body Reacts Differently In The Cold 05:27 Strategies If You Find Someone Getting Cold 10:31 No Filter, No BS 15:50 Getting Into The Right Mindset 19:01 Controlling Your Mind 28:35 Cold Water Adaptation 31:52 What Is The Best Way To Train For An Openwater Swim?

My guest today is Peter Bloor from Vietnam. I invited him on the podcast to talk about the impressive results he has observed after day two of the '5 Day Catch Challenge'. He shared about what he had changed and did to make such an improvement. 1:00 Swimming Background 3:35 Did the '5 Day Catch Challenge' Each Day Twice 4:45 Less Tired And Feeling Better 5:45 The Importance Of Slow To Fast 8:19 One Focus A Day Is The Way To Go 10:05 Watching Swim Videos On Youtube 12:11 Training Sessions 13:53 8th Week Program

My guest today is Jeff Grace from Swimming Specific Yoga. Jeff has been in the podcast before. Now he is coming back to talk more about body awareness, mobility. preparation and many more. 02:26 Moving Better With Yoga 04:55 Body Awareness in Overhead Movements 06:55 Thoracic Mobility 08:18 Increasing Thoracic Spine Mobility 12:36 Rock Not Roll 13:21 Cross-Body Connections 15:05 How You Perform Drills Is More Important Than How Many Drill You Do 17:04 Activation and Relaxation 18:44 Effortless Effort 23:10 The Breath 26:02 Preparation

My guest today is Bevan Mckinnon. He is a coach at Fitter Coaching and he hosts a podcast called Fitter Radio. Bevan coaches multiple pro triathletes who have won several Ironman and 70.3 Distance Events. He has also won the Age Group World Championships in Kona and other long course events. In this episode, we are talking about some of the lessons that he has learned over the last several years of coaching and how they might apply to triathletes and swimmers who are looking to get better at swimming. 8:41 Environment And Coaching 9:57 Being An Objective Coach 11:27 Coaching Pros and Age Groupers. Is There A Difference? 12:47 Art of Coaching And The Science of Coaching 14:56 Teaching Teachers How To Teach 18:21 Giving The Athletes The Power To Decide 27:52 Swim Chute 33:40 Increasing Stroke Rate Finding The Right Resource

In todays episode, I want to go over an article that I was sent recently by Bevan Mckinnon who host the podcast Fitter Radio. I thought it is going to be worhtwhile going over this article that he sent because when I first read the title and when I read the first couple of paragraphs, it kind of got my hackels up a little bit, thinking that this is not right but as I continue to read through it, I found myself agreeing to most of this. 1:50 This Isn't Right 2:49 Drills Change Certain Aspect Of The Stroke 3:14 Knowing The Purpose Of The Drill 4:17 Making It As Simple As Possible 5:32 YMCA Drill Progression 10:36 Make Sure You're Doing The Drills Correctly

Joining us in this episode is Kris Martenstyn from Singapore, who had some great results from the 5 Day Catch Challenge that we recently run. He will talk about the improvements he has seen and what he may have changed about his stroke to get these results.1:02 Swimming Background 2:56 Bringing In The 5 Day Catch Challenge Into My Workouts 4:19 The Entry 9:09 It Was Good To Come Back To Basics 12:00  Good Technique And Relaxation In The Water 15:33 Stick To The Routine 16:39 Swimming Makes You a Better Runner 17:58 Going Forwards 19:39 Achievement UnlockedPUT the 5-day catch link

My guest today is Quang Pham who recently had a significant improvement with his swim time. I thought it would be useful to have him share what he has done to improve. Listen to this episode, you might pick a couple of things that you might implement on your own. 1:40 Benchmarks 04:29 What Made The Difference 5:48 Swimming Has Become Easier 7:18 What Works Best For Me 8:37 What Got Me Into The Pool 12:00 The Next Step 13:59 Having A Structure 15:52 Initializing The Catch With The Ring And Pinky Finger