On Saturday evening, July 14th, 11 swimmers from the Londonderry Workout Club and Wellness Center participated in a stroke clinic with Bob Boder and Bill Ewan, hosted by the Salem Athletic Club in Salem, NH (where one of our swimmers, Sheryl “Scotty” Scott is the Aquatic Director). Our workout group is “un-coached,” meaning we don’t have a coach on deck who is able to assist us with stroke technique. So… we continue to make the same mistakes over and over because we don’t know we are making them in the first place! Our goal in participating in this clinic as a group was to be filmed and critiqued, so that later we would be able to assist each other with the flaws discovered in our strokes.

Bob and Bill’s clinic was very organized. They began by giving a brief explanation of how their camera equipment (3 pieces) would be used in videotaping and critiquing us. We each chose one or 2 strokes to be filmed and swam 4 lengths of each stroke.

The 1st camera was underwater and stationary at the deep end of the pool. The resulting VHS tape was given to the clinic coordinator to either make individual copies for each participant or to share with the group as a whole.

The 2nd camera was operated by Bob, who filmed and critiqued the participant’s stroke above the water. The resulting DVD was given to the clinic coordinator, who in turn made copies for each participant.

The 3rd camera was operated by Bill underwater with 2 views. The 1st two lengths Bill positioned himself at the shallow end of the lane and filmed the swimmer both going & coming. The 2nd two lengths, he positioned himself approximately two lanes over about midway down the pool, filming each side. The result of this third taping will produce a CD and an individualized 1 page written critique for each participant.

As you can guess, we can hardly wait for the underwater film and written critiques to arrive; however, we also got immediate feedback at the clinic. Once we were done filming, we moved into a room where we viewed the results from the 2nd camera (above water) on a TV and the 3rd camera (under water) on Bill’s laptop with Bill and Bob providing stroke critique.

Click here for a pdf containing the attendee feedback!