The flip turn is either a swimmer’s worst nightmare or their best friend. Flip turns can help you win a race, or piss you off as you see slower swimmers beat you off of every wall.
Growing up as a swimmer, I always preferred long course meters to short course yards. During short course I didn’t feel especially slow on my turns, but once long course came around it was obvious my turns were really holding me back as I effortlessly beat teammates who decimated me during short course.
I will never forget the day one of my coaches asked, “Why don’t you get smaller when you flip?”
I was confused, why didn’t I? “Point your toes,” he said “it’ll force your legs to hit the wall faster.”
And he was right. The less I thought about the turn, and the more I threw my head down and focused on pointing my toes, the faster I was ready to push off the wall. The first time I did it this way, my turn was so fast that I sat there, waiting to push off the wall, in a sort of stunned silence before I remembered what I was doing. After a 200, I was dizzy. After a 500, I hated it. After 3 weeks, I hardly noticed it anymore, but I was faster.
Each time you change a part of your stroke or race, it feels bad and unnatural. Your body won’t like it because it’s new, and your mind won’t like it because it doesn’t feel as good as it used to. But at the end of the day, I only had to think about it for 3 weeks, after that it was second nature.
What is a turn?
For all you beginners, a turn is the glue that connects one length of the pool to the other. You use flip turns when swimming freestyle and backstroke. You use open turns when swimming butterfly and breaststroke. Turns are brandished as weapons by anyone good at short course and all sprinters.
Distance swimmers are allowed to be bad at flip turns, that is an unspoken rule.
What is a flip turn?
A flip turn is a flip, done directly in front of the wall. When the swimmer’s head is about an arm length’s from the wall, they will bring their head straight down and then bring the rest of their body over the top of their head until their feet come to the wall. Then, the swimmer pushes off.
Think of a front flip, then put it 2-3 inches from a wall. That’s a flip turn.
Check out the video below for an example.
What is an open turn?
An open turn is used to get off the wall when swimming butterfly or backstroke. This turn is also used during the entirety of an individual medley. The only time you wouldn’t do an open turn is if you are swimming backstroke-backstroke, freestyle-freestyle, backstroke-freestyle, or freestyle-backstroke.
Check out the video below for an example.
Why do I need this and how would I do it?
The short answer is that you really don’t NEED it. You could swim into a wall, grab it, touch the floor, turn your body around, and push off. But, omg that would take so long, and why would you risk the disruption of flow to do all that? You wouldn't, at least you wouldn't if you knew a better way.
Turns can be tricky though, especially if you haven’t done one before. So, I urge you to start slow, and away from the wall.
Breaking it down: flipturns
A flip turn is just that, a flip. All you are doing with your body is getting it into a tight little ball and spinning all the way around. That’s all!
Of course that's not as simple as it sounds, so begin your flipping career on something you can flip around, like a noodle or a lane line.
Place the noodle or lane line on your stomach, and roll your body around it. The goal is to bring your face from facing the pool floor to facing the ceiling. Practice this a few times…
If you haven’t done a flip before, you may find your body coming apart from itself, your legs going out to the side while your head points straight down at the floor. If this happens, curl yourself tighter, bring your chin into your chest and your knees into your chest so that your forehead is almost smacking the tops of your knees [extra points if your knees actually do hit your forehead!]
Practice this. Record your attempts. Watch your attempts. Learn from your failures. Practice it again.
Once you can flip straight, you are ready to move closer to the wall, and follow the steps below:
Swim freestyle into the wall until you are about 3in from the wall.
Pull your head down and pull your body in a tight ball, with your chin in tight to your chest and your knees in tight to your chest.
Flip, blowing your nose out the entire time. A nose that's blowing air out cannot get water in.
Once you have flipped, your face will be pointing up towards the surface, your knees will be bent with your shins pointing up towards the surface, and your toes will be pointed (the end of your tight ball). Stop and flatten your feet in this so that they can touch the wall (if you are too far from the wall you may have to straighten your legs to get there -- this ok! We will be straightening our legs in a little bit anyway).
Put your feet on the wall.
Bring your arms up around your head to get into streamline.
Push off the wall on your back, and do a few dolphin kicks, letting your kick rotate you from your back to your stomach.
Watch the video below. Can you spot all the steps in this video?
All that being said, flipturns from backstroke to backstroke or backstroke to freestyle, are a different story. This story is not overwhelmingly complex, but it does require a few extra steps.
First, you will need to know how many strokes it takes you to get the wall. When you swim backstroke you are not looking at the wall, so the chance of bonking your head increases. This is why we count our strokes. A stroke count is like a sleep number, each person may have a different one. It’s based entirely on your stroke.
To find your stroke count:
Swim backstroke all the way to the wall. Once you see the flags, begin counting your strokes. If your pool doesn’t have any flags, the lane lines will probably have some sort of color variation to indicate where the flags would be (usually 5y or 5m -- depending on the size of your pool). If there aren’t any flags or any color variation, pick a point that you can see on each end and count from there.
Once you have your count (hopefully you didn’t hit your head on the way in), you need to subtract 2-3 strokes from it. The amount you subtract is also based on you and your stroke, and may not be the same for everyone. In other words, there may be quite a few failed attempts during this process, don’t give up.
When you have your subtracted number, swim into the wall, starting your count at the flags, and flipping onto your stomach once you reach your subtracted number.
Once you flip, evaluate where you are, are you close enough to the wall to flip? Ideally you would be close enough to go right into the flip, as opposed to having to glide in or kick into the wall (both of which are ok and legal in competitive swimming).
The number that takes you 2-3 inches from the wall for your flip is your stroke count. However, be aware! This may not be your final stroke count! If your stroke changes, your count may too.
Take some time to figure this out. Once you have your perfect stroke count, slot it into your brain, and do the flip as normal. The cool thing about doing a flip turn from backstroke into backstroke is that you don’t have to flip from your back onto your stomach after the turn -- all you have to do is push off the wall.
Take a look at the video below. You aren't able to see all my strokes into the wall, but you can see what I do once I satisfy my stroke count.
Breaking it down: open turns
An open turn is, to someone like me, perfectly descriptive of what an open-turn actually is. That’s because it’s the same as a flipturn, but “open” meaning it’s not monogamous.
Haha.
Ok, sorry. An open turn is the same as a flipturn, but it’s “open” meaning you don’t have to curl yourself into a tiny ball.
Open turns are done to connect butterfly-butterfly, breaststroke-breaststroke, butterfly-breaststroke, breaststroke-butterfly, or butterfly-backstroke-breaststroke-freestyle during an IM.
The steps of an open turn are as follows:
Glide into the wall (this should not be a long glide, just 1-2 seconds where your hands are out in front of you. Just long enough for your body to grab the wall.
Grab the wall firmly, and bring your knees up to your chin so that your feet can grab onto the wall.
Let go of the wall with your dominant hand and bend your dominant elbow, so that your arm is at a 90 degree angle. Your other hand should still be holding onto the wall, and your feet should still be on the wall with your knees bent and legs pulled into your body.
Your 90 degree angled arm should then “elbow your brother and call your mother,” meaning it should make that motion. So, your hand will come to your ear (to call your “mother”) as your elbow comes up as if to elbow someone (your “brother”) directly in front of you.
Bring your hand to your ear, past it, and then slip that arm straight behind you.
The hand that’s holding onto the wall should let go and bend to lengthen to reach the arm that’s already straight behind you.
Connect your two arms in streamline and push off the wall.
The push should twist you from your back to your front.
Get it? Can you spot all the steps in this video?
Now what?
So, you’ve done your turn, you’ve done your flip, you’ve pushed off the wall -- now what?
That will have to wait for another day. Stay turned for my upcoming posts on:
Kicking off the wall -- the 15m/y rule
What is an underwater pullout?
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