Time to get a bigger pull buoy.....

pgibbo

Saw him tweeting about pull bouys the other day. Finally got around to having a look on the site. This is an interesting read.

Not much use for Vegas or Kona though where the swims are non-wetsuit.

What do the swimmers or coaches think?

Personally I average around 3s per 100 faster with a lower RPE when using the pull buoy. It certainly makes swimming easier for me and gives me a higher elbow for the pull.

tunney

pgibbo wrote: »

Saw him tweeting about pull bouys the other day. Finally got around to having a look on the site. This is an interesting read.

Not much use for Vegas or Kona though where the swims are non-wetsuit.

What do the swimmers or coaches think?

Personally I average around 3s per 100 faster with a lower RPE when using the pull buoy. It certainly makes swimming easier for me and gives me a higher elbow for the pull.

Few years ago I ditched the normal pull buoy for a speedo swim kick one, makes a huge difference. Its massive.

us mere mortals should be faster with a pull buoy by far alright!

sconhome

Glue two together for extra buoyancy.

Interesting viewpoint though.

RacoonQueen

tunney wrote: »

Few years ago I ditched the normal pull buoy for a speedo swim kick one, makes a huge difference. Its massive.

us mere mortals should be faster with a pull buoy by far alright!

Link? or is it that one that doubles as a kickboard?

hf4z6sqo7vjngi

I can be up to 10secs per 100mtr quicker with the pull buoy. After reading that i should really upgrade the current one as its one of the sh1t tiny ones.
Love swimming with the pull buoy it makes everything feel much smoother in the water.

tunney

RacoonQueen wrote: »

Link? or is it that one that doubles as a kickboard?

Doubles as a kick board. not *quite* as easy to use as a pull buoy or a kick board as stand alones but its nice.

BTH

I have one of these beasts. barely fits in my swim bag. It's class.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Kiefer-Large-Swimming-Pullbuoy/sim/B005G2CR4E/2

Oryx

But if you happen to end up doing a pool swim or non wetsuit swim, would being used to this mean youre screwed?

pgibbo

Oryx wrote: »

But if you happen to end up doing a pool swim or non wetsuit swim, would being used to this mean youre screwed?

I think it's all about striking a balance with training and specificity closer to your event.

miller82

So basically training with the buoy means its more like race (wetsuit) scenario ?
But as someone mentioned, if it ends up being a non wetsuit race, then you may struggle a little to get that horizontal position required for efficient swimming, as you havent trained as much without.

Useful training aids, but you wouldn’t want to be going OTT on them

Briando

15% of your propulsion comes from your legs. I wonder what the energy cost is of kick the legs of you total wattage spent swimming per second. I would guess it must be about double the percentage of the propulsion.

I dont kick in my wetsuit at all unless I am removing a passenger from my ass.

BTH

Briando wrote: »

I dont kick in my wetsuit at all unless I am removing a passenger from my ass.

Why wouldn't you kick in a wetsuit? Sure, theres no need to kick in a wetsuit as the suit gives you the buoyancy that a kick would provide. But surely you're in a race, and kicking is faster than non-kicking. I can perhaps understand not kicking much an IM, or even a slower kick in a HIM if you're worried about the distance. At the end of the day its a race and the fastest way to get through the swim is to kick. Unless you're a beginner worried about completing the distance, kicking in the swim should really not have a detrimental effect on your bike or run split?

Bambaata

I seem to be the opposite to most then, i'm faster without the pull buoy and im not a huge kicker, about 5-8s/100m. From reading that though i'm thinking my pull buoy is far too small!

peter kern

Briando wrote: »

15% of your propulsion comes from your legs. I wonder what the energy cost is of kick the legs of you total wattage spent swimming per second. I would guess it must be about double the percentage of the propulsion.


hm if ian thorpe kicks 400m in sub 5 min .......
also depends female and male

Briando

peter kern wrote: »

Briando wrote: »

15% of your propulsion comes from your legs. I wonder what the energy cost is of kick the legs of you total wattage spent swimming per second. I would guess it must be about double the percentage of the propulsion.


hm if ian thorpe kicks 400m in sub 5 min .......
also depends female and male

When I swim without a wetsuit I kick, to keep my legs up and to help with balance.

But in a wetsuit my legs are rediculously high so pointless for me since when I do a kick set in the pool I move so slow,yet it take so much effort, that it seems it inefficient for me to kick. Keep that energy and use it to pull better with my arms. Thats how it works for me, I'm not advocating everybody should be doing this, it just works for me.

Trig1

what percentage of training should be done with a pull buoy and without..are we talking 50/50 .... only just got a pull buoy last week.... I love open water swimming obviously with the buoyancy but I have big legs and unfortunately in the pool these big legs dont float .. always have difficulty keeping the legs high in the water thus the reason why I bought the pull buoy... i'm wondering now from this article should i have bought a bigger pull buoy?? should i do all my training with one?? what about the pool triathlons in April/May... i wonder will they let me bring in a pull buoy, I'm sure they wont even notice

pgibbo

Spotted on twitter this morning that Huub are launching a new pull buoy called the "BIG BUOY". It looks damn big

peter kern

Briando wrote: »

peter kern wrote: »

When I swim without a wetsuit I kick, to keep my legs up and to help with balance.

But in a wetsuit my legs are rediculously high so pointless for me since when I do a kick set in the pool I move so slow,yet it take so much effort, that it seems it inefficient for me to kick. Keep that energy and use it to pull better with my arms. Thats how it works for me, I'm not advocating everybody should be doing this, it just works for me.

which is cool iam just saying there is people that get more propolsion from kicking than others and if somebody can kick great.

pgibbo

Anyone know if the Big Buoy is available to buy yet?

Is our very own AKW going to stock it and look after us boardsies??? :pac:

El Director

pgibbo wrote: »

Anyone know if the Big Buoy is available to buy yet?

Is our very own AKW going to stock it and look after us boardsies??? :pac:

You could go for one of these

20 sterling for one plus P&P of 10 sterling :eek:

sconhome

pgibbo wrote: »

Anyone know if the Big Buoy is available to buy yet?

Is our very own AKW going to stock it and look after us boardsies??? :pac:

Yes, they are available. Enquiries have been made & of course I'd look after you!

El Director wrote: »

You could go for one of these

20 sterling for one plus P&P of 10 sterling :eek:

Same jobbie that P is talking about. From what I understand they're likely to be around €27-28 RRP. If there is interest (10-20) I should be able to get them down around €22ish.

If interested stick a +1 below and I'll confirm a cost in the next day or two.

littlemsfickle

amphkingwest wrote: »

Yes, they are available. Enquiries have been made & of course I'd look after you!



Same jobbie that P is talking about. From what I understand they're likely to be around €27-28 RRP. If there is interest (10-20) I should be able to get them down around €22ish.

If interested stick a +1 below and I'll confirm a cost in the next day or two.

+1 - I'd be interested in a group buy:)

El Director

+1

pgibbo

+1

couerdelion

+1

interested

... at least one person that's already replied still kicks when doing pull with his pull buoy

Pull buoys, band work, drag belts, kick boards, fins of various shapes and sizes, paddles of various shapes and sizes... metronomes inside a swim hat even ... are all useful things to bring to a pool - if they make you faster. Whats cool is by simply swimming more (casually assuming stroke is there or there abouts with all the big issues sorted), more frequently and at the right pace over a period of time will also make you faster ... in a pool

... and there's the OW can-o-worms.

tunney

+1

BTH

interested wrote: »

... at least one person that's already replied still kicks when doing pull with his pull buoy

And I hadn't even replied yet

Cheers for the deal again Sean, but I have a sufficiently large pull buoy already. Damn thing barely fits in my bag!!

BUACHAILL

amphkingwest wrote: »

Yes, they are available. Enquiries have been made & of course I'd look after you!



Same jobbie that P is talking about. From what I understand they're likely to be around €27-28 RRP. If there is interest (10-20) I should be able to get them down around €22ish.

If interested stick a +1 below and I'll confirm a cost in the next day or two.

+1 I would be interested also !! thanks

hf4z6sqo7vjngi

+1 although judging from the photo the buoy might be bigger than me.

RacoonQueen

interested wrote: »

... at least one person that's already replied still kicks when doing pull with his pull buoy

So do I sometimes. Found it hard to stop kicking, my first pull buoy experience taught me why you don't kick with the pull buoy. Talk about chaffing. :eek:

+1 for me too AKW

I might get around to that headtorch at the same time.

sconhome

Ashlyn Stale Munitions wrote: »

+1 although judging from the photo the buoy might be bigger than me.

Don't worry I'll just write 'Life Raft' on the outside of the parcel so you don't feel too intimidated.

Cheers for the interest folks. I'll get cracking with the pencil sharpener.

ray o

+1

Bambaata

+1

RedB

+1

MayoRoadRunner

+1

EC1000

+1

sconhome

I'm closing off this thread on 1st December as I need to confirm the order so everyone gets their Big Buoy while they are still in the pool training. I have PM'd everyone who has expressed interest so far and you are all included. Thankyou.

sconhome

Thanks to the nudge I just got, I put a follow up call into the agent. Its one of those good news / bad news situations.

Good news the order is placed.

Bad news, they are completely and utterly out of stock in UK distributors and no more due until the New Year. (I should have been told that when I first enquired about a group deal)

Good news the price won't be any different, that I can hold. I fully understand if anyone wants to remove themselves from the list to source independently through online stores but I will retain the names for first, come first served once they arrive.

You'll know more as soon as I know more. Sorry about getting hopes up.

tunney

DO NOT GOOGLE BIG BUOY IN WORK

sconhome

After a long wait they have finally arrived in Ireland. I'm fire a PM off to all of you that expressed interest and we'll figure out how best to get them to you.

pgibbo

amphkingwest wrote: »

After a long wait they have finally arrived in Ireland. I'm fire a PM off to all of you that expressed interest and we'll figure out how best to get them to you.

Airmail for me :rolleyes:

BTH

pgibbo wrote: »

Airmail for me :rolleyes:

Yeah, throw it at him good and hard!!

sconhome

BTH wrote: »

Yeah, throw it at him good and hard!!

I'm glad you qualified that statement by 'throw' and not 'give'.

With all the double entendre possible around the use of the phrase 'Big Buoy', I could have a hard time convincing the wife that these are actually emails from customers about a product, and they're not looking for a 'service'.

El Director

amphkingwest wrote: »

I'm glad you qualified that statement by 'throw' and not 'give'.

With all the double entendre possible around the use of the phrase 'Big Buoy', I could have a hard time convincing the wife that these are actually emails from customers about a product, and they're not looking for a 'service'.

:pac::pac::pac::cool:

hf4z6sqo7vjngi

I plan to use mine as a canoe.

GoHardOrGoHome

Sorry to revive an old thread but I can't find these anywhere. Base2Race didn't have them. Anybody know where to get them or does anybody who got one from AKW want to sell?!

rooneyjm

I'm sure Ray O will sell his, he's selling everything. PM him

ray o

rooneyjm wrote: »

I'm sure Ray O will sell his, he's selling everything. PM him

:):)

I would but I left it at pool side one morning. Peter Kern claimed it was too big for him to put in his bag so he left it on top of the lockers. It was long gone when I got back to the pool. I think he took it home and uses it as a rescue buoy at his open water sessions.

FWIW I now use a zone3 PB from B2R that I really like.

Any interest in a TYR Transition Backpack?

mossym

i think akw still has some? i picked up one from him a year ago after this deal was done, but i seem to recal him saying he might have a couple more. did you give him a call?

mossym

ray o wrote: »

Any interest in a TYR Transition Backpack?

which model? any pics?