Coordinate Arms and Legs for Front Crawl

When learning to swim, how do I coordinate arms and legs for front crawl? I am in my 60s and just learning to swim. When moving my arms my legs will not move in tandem. Sorry sounds a bit sad.

The problem you are referring to is related to your coordination.

Front crawl is an alternating stroke. In other words as one arm pulls the other recovers and as one leg kicks downwards the other kicks upwards.

Unlike breaststroke which is a simultaneous swimming stroke where both arms pull at the same time and both legs also kick at the same time.

You will find that your coordination will favour one more than the other because one will come more naturally than the other.

The timing and coordination of front crawl arms and legs is not something that comes naturally to some people but there is no reason why it cannot be learnt.

A simple exercise to try out is front crawl ‘catch up’. Hold a float or kick board with both hands and kick your legs. Then perform one arm pull at a time, taking hold of the float after each complete arm action. You are therefore performing front crawl arms one at a time whilst attempting to maintain your leg kick. Holding the float will help you to focus on your leg kick whilst using your arms.

As for how fast to kick your legs, there is no right or wrong here. The 6 beat cycle is the most traditional where there are 6 leg kicks to each arm cycle (there are 2 arm pulls to a cycle). A 4 beat cycle is also a common pattern and a 1 beat cycle is one of the most common.

Keep in mind that most of the power to generate the movement for front crawl comes from the arms and the legs are there mainly to balance or provide a small amount of power.

For this reason a 1 beat cycle can be quite effective especially as kicking the legs at faster speeds can be very tiring. One leg kicks and one arm pulls.

What you have described is very common and not sad at all. With some practice you will soon have a respectful front crawl swimming stroke.

Our best-selling book 'The Complete Guide to Swimming Front Crawl' contains over 20 separate swimming exercises to help all parts of front crawl, including timing and coordination. You can download it, print out the parts you need and take them to your pool to try out. Click the link below for more information.

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