Check out this video of Terry Laughlin demonstrating the TI freestyle stroke:
The key thing to note is that he “spears” the water ahead of him and sustains this position for a few more moments while relaxing his hand. Also notice that he’s not really using his legs that much at all.
A lot of his forward momentum is actually coming from him driving his hips down. In other words, there’s very little emphasis on “grabbing and pulling” the water – which flies directly in the face of most swim instruction these days.
I recently adjusted my swim stroke accordingly, and I’ve noticed about a substantial improvement in being able to go faster and longer while using much less energy. Try it out!
he sure is digging clams with his reach to the bottom of the pool ?