( 5 reviews )
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Posted: Aug 28 2006
I spent a fortune on private, Total Immersion swim coaching and still couldn't swim more than 250 yd without a splitting headache. Didn't expect to get much from a book on swimming, but was desperate. It was great! I figured out exactly what I was doing wrong (kicking too fast), and went out and swam a mile. I'm not making this up! Would have given it five stars, but the pictures were not as clear as I'd hoped. Could have used more illustrations or photos, but directions were extremely clear.
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( 6 of 6 found this review helpful ) Posted: Nov 16 2005
I wanted to learn how to swim better. I tried a few other books, worked hard, and got nowhere. I began to believe it was impossible to learn swimming from a book. Swimming books tend to be lists of little things which can make you swim better. These lists are addressed to people who already know how to swim and do not add up to instructions for a new swimmer. Tarpinians book is different. It told me in a simple fashion what I needed to do, how to do it and why. Reading just a handful of pages from this book has been the single most effective thing I've done to improve my swimming.
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( 9 of 9 found this review helpful ) Posted: Oct 6 2003
The brevity of this effective, perfectly edited swimming manual is sweet indeed. Not one word too long, it will teach you to swim better than you ever have before, teaching you the fundamentals of freestyle, improving your freestyle, and then using a goal-oriented drill program, developing the four main strokes of swimming (freestyle, breastroke, backstroke, and butterfly). It touches on strength training and the brief nutrion chapter, which basically says, if you eat garbage (empty calories) insteady of health food (fruits and vegetables) is better than a lot of popular nutrition books I've read. Practical, resourceful, and knowledgeable, the books is truly like having a coach right there.
