Torpedo Swimtalk Podcast - TST Quick Splash with Steve West

In our series of flashback Torpedo Swimtalk Podcast TST Deep Dive pods, we re visit our chat with Californian Steve West.

Steve is a Masters World Record Holder and so we listened carefully to all his advice. Particularly on the drill he learned from his Olympic training partners under Dave Salo, many years ago.

It worked for him then and still works for him now. It could also work for you!

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Transcript

Danielle Spurling: 0:02

What's your favourite open water swimming location?

Steve West: 0:06

Yeah, that's tough. I don't know if I have a favourite place. I guess I'll just say Huntington Beach, because that's where I go the most, i know it the most, but I love going in any. I get it Like if I go somewhere and I see the water I'm like I want to get in that. So I don't know why, but Hawaii is probably the best because it's not so cold.

Danielle Spurling: 0:28

And what about the best pool in Southern California?

Steve West: 0:31

My favourite pool to race in is actually the USC pool, which is where they held the 84 Olympic Games. I swim really well there. for some reason. That's actually where I swam that 2018 was at USC. That's my favourite pool. It's not the best pool, but that's probably my favourite one. I don't know if there's a best. I mean where we swim in Irvine might be considered the best because it's two 50 meter pools and all that other stuff, But my favourite is USC pool.

Danielle Spurling: 0:58

Yeah, sorry, I should have said favourite. Yeah, your favourite. And what are your favourite race goggles to swim in?

Steve West: 1:07

I've been using the Speedo ones lately, but I don't have which would. I don't even know what they're called, but they're the kind of the flatter ones I've been using those lately. When I was younger I used the Speedo Sprint and I bought a pair of those and I put them on the other day and I'm like man mix, your cross-eyed. I'm like no wonder we couldn't swim fast because they're terrible. But yeah, i'm not super tied to a specific goggle. I used to be sponsored by Tira a little bit and I use those goggles quite a bit, so but yeah, i've been using the Speedo lately just because that's working.

Danielle Spurling: 1:45

What's your favourite breaststroke drill to do in training?

Steve West: 1:48

I find that the doing like well, i like a lot of them. But kick-kick pull is good. Two kicks to a pull is a good like all-around warm up kind of a drill to do. But I do a lot of different ones. Dave taught me a lot of them, so I usually pick a drill that is appropriate to the thing I'm having a problem with. So we could have a whole session on all the different drills to do. But kick, kick, pulls a good base. Two kicks to a pulls good base And like. What I like about it is it kind of keeps you getting into the length of the stroke And you have to hold your breath a little bit. You can kind of go fast sometimes with it. One other thing I didn't mention earlier that maybe some of you out there, if there's people in training I usually do flip turns for breaststroke And I picked that up again from Michigan via Mike Barrowman, via Joseph Nage, i would say is probably the innovator of that technique And we use that when I was swimming with Amanda And we use that when I was swimming with Stacey on a stits here. She made the 2000 Olympic team. We were doing that And I still do it to this day because I don't wanna go, and the other part I don't wanna have a practice where I'm just doing shitty turns all the time. If I'm gonna practice the turns, i'm gonna do them well, otherwise we're just gonna do breaststroke, flip turn, hold your breath, come out of it. It's better for keeping your rhythm. So that's probably something that other people might be interested in knowing we do. It takes a while to get used to doing that, but once you get used to it it's pretty second nature. And then the other reason to do it is I can. If I'm swimming next to someone who's maybe my speed their freestyle is by breaststroke speed I can keep up with them and they could go free and I can go breast and I don't lose on the walls because I'm doing the same thing they do through the turn. So when you do that, are you still doing your breakout underwater or you just do it as Yeah so, like last stroke flip and then a regular pull out, regular pull down and out, and I think for me it keeps the nice rhythm going. It's a great training methodology. Obviously you can't do it in a real meet, but it's a way to just keep your rhythm through the stroke and all of that.

Danielle Spurling: 4:21

And what's your favourite breaststroke training set?

Steve West: 4:24

I think a good test set that I would do every once in a while if I'm doing threshold would be. this is, with flip turns of course, to go like 600 breast on 130 or even maybe sometimes 140, but 130 and try to go like 109s. this is yards, but I don't actually have like a go to set, and part of that is when I swim masters with people like I just kind of adapt, like I have no plan when I get to the pool. I don't know. It's like most masters coaches, even ours here. they aren't geared for breaststroke, so I'll just adapt to the set as long as I'm not getting in someone's way or I try to go the same distance as everybody else and same intervals or whatever. so I'm not in the way But I find myself having to adapt things. I like kicking a lot too, so I would say kicking probably is my favourite set.