Swimming Breaststroke – Arm Movements and Technique

This article explains the movements and technique of the arms while swimming breaststroke. Knowing how to properly move your arms is important if you want to achieve an efficient breaststroke. The following video nicely explains the breaststroke arm movements:

As you can see above, when you are swimming breaststroke your arms stay in the water all the time and execute a semicircular movement. That’s because breaststroke is the only one of the competitive strokes where the arm recovery occurs in the water. More about this technique below.

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Arm Stroke Phases

When swimming breaststroke the arm movements can be divided into five phases:

• Glide Phase
• Outsweep
• Catch
• Insweep
• Recovery

Let’s discuss these arm stroke phases in more detail.

Glide Phase

To start our discussion, let’s consider that you are in the glide phase. You are gliding forward on your chest, being horizontal in the water. Your arms are extended forward, your hands are close together, with the palms facing downwards. Your legs are extended too, pressed together and your toes are pointed.

Glide

Outsweep

Now the outsweep of the arms begins. Your palms turn slightly outwards and your arms slide sideways until they are outside of the shoulders. You keep your arms straight and your elbows close to the water surface. Seen from above your body forms an Y-like shape. This phase is not propulsive.

Outsweep

Catch

During the catch you change the orientation of your arms so that your forearms and palms are facing backwards. This prepares the propulsive phase of the arm stroke.

To do so you flex your arms at the elbows once they are outside the shoulders at the end of the outsweep. Then move your forearms downward and backward while your elbows stay close to the water surface.

Do this until your forearms are vertical and facing backwards and your palms are in line with your forearms. This phase is also not propulsive, so avoid using any force before your forearms are vertical.

Catch

Insweep

The insweep is the propulsive phase of the arm stroke. So once you have made the catch with your forearms, move your arms backwards, then inwards and upwards so that you sweep diagonally backwards against the water.

Insweep

During the insweep you bring your hands below your chest and your elbows against your rib cage. At the end of the insweep your palms should be facing each other.

End of Insweep – Start of Recovery

Recovery

Once your hands are close together under your chest at the end of the insweep, move them forward just below the water surface until your arms are extended again, ready for the next stroke cycle.

Middle of Recovery

Once your arms are extended, you can again observe a short glide phase.

Back into Streamlined Glide

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Arm Speeds and Force Applied During the Stroke Cycle

The arm speeds and force applied while swimming breaststroke change during each phase of the stroke cycle:

• During the outsweep and catch you should not apply any force because otherwise you will only push water sideways or down. As a consequence your arms should move at moderate speed.
• Because the insweep is propulsive you should obviously apply force on your arms and move them quickly.
• The recovery should also occur swiftly but without using force because otherwise you will only create unnecessary drag.

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