We’re entering the season of the year when, where I live, the kids’ summer swim leagues are beginning their practices and meets.  Some of these are held in pools.  Others are held in lakes where there are docks that have been carefully placed so as to be separated by 25 yards or 25 meters or, in a few cases, 50 meters, with lane lines strung between them and the standard flags that, in pools, are designed to warn backstrokers that they are approaching the wall, but in lakes, where there are no painted lines on the bottom, often serve to warn breaststrokers, butterfliers, and freestylers of the same thing.

Except for backstroke, all of these events begin with what is called a forward start.  This start is normally done by diving from a starting block.  The rules for USA Swimming, U.S. Masters Swimming, and NCAA also permit a swimmer to start in the water with at least one hand touching the side of the pool, but I know of few self-respecting swimmers who would actually be willing to do this, since most of them would see it as a very visible way of advertising that they really don’t know what they’re doing (sort of like using a tricycle, or a bicycle with training wheels, for the biking part of a triathlon).

For more than a year now, I’ve been doing most of my practices alongside a kids’ swim team, and as a coach, I sometimes find myself observing what they’re doing, both from above and from below the water.  Here are some assorted things I’ve noted about forward starts:

> Swimmers who are learning to do forward starts, and who have no diving background, tend to want to enter the water like a partially open jackknife (i.e., they already have their head and arms down, but don’t find it natural to get their legs and feet up).

> Swimmers who are learning to do forward starts, and who have experience diving off a diving board, tend to want to enter the water as though they were going off a diving platform (i.e., they have no trouble getting their legs and feet up, but they find it natural to enter the water as though their target were the bottom of the pool rather than the far end of the pool).

> Swimmers who don’t get their legs and feet up enough make a big splash when they enter the water, get a red chest and belly, and also don’t succeed in really getting under the water, which prevents them from being able to streamline well.

> Swimmers who go off the blocks as though they were going off a diving platform go too deep, and end up having to climb back to the surface, significantly increasing the distance they have to travel, and costing them precious time.

> Until a swimmer hits the water, a forward start is sort of a cross between a standing broad jump and a high jump.  I suspect that dryland practice of these two types of jumps might improve a swimmer’s forward starts.

> There’s a similarity between a good arm entry in freestyle and a good body entry in a forward start.  In both, you want to strive for a "mail slot" entry in which your hand entry cuts a hole in the water and everything else slides in through that same hole.

> Having your head too high when you enter the water is as bad as having it too high when you’re swimming.  It is also possible, if your head is too high when you hit the water, for the impact of the water to give you two black eyes!  Enter the water in a tight streamline, with your nose pointed at the bottom.

> Many pools take it for granted that kids (even kids who have been swimming competitively for a decade or more) need to regularly practice their forward starts, but make absolutely no provision for adult competitive swimmers to do the same thing.  Why this is isn’t clear, but unless and until it changes, it’s useful for adults to look for a pool that isn’t too strict about enforcing its rules.