Butterfly Stroke

Butterfly Vs. Freestyle Swimming

If you want to swim with power, the butterfly is an obvious choice. If you want to swim fast with a smooth, fluid motion, the freestyle is a good option. Butterfly and freestyle swimming are popular competitive events, but they feature drastically different body movements. The butterfly requires upper body strength while the freestyle synchronizes the upper and lower body. Once you learn and practice the proper techniques for the butterfly and freestyle, you can work to become competitive in both styles of swimming.

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All About Butterfly Stroke

The Best Exercises to Swim the Butterfly

The butterfly is a difficult swimming stroke to master; it requires synchronization between two main parts of your body, your arms and legs. A strong dolphin kick and the strength of your upper body are required to propel and p...

How to Swim More Distance in the Butterfly

Mastering the butterfly stroke is the pinnacle of achievement for many amateur swimmers. When you're starting out with the stroke, you may have difficulty lasting the same distances you normally manage for simpler strokes. To i...

How to Improve the Butterfly Technique

When learning how to swim, butterfly is often the last stroke taught, and for good reason. Butterfly is a challenging stroke requiring coordination, speed, endurance and strength. Unlike freestyle and backstroke, butterfly requ...

What Is a 100M Butterfly?

A 100 m butterfly is one of the events at a standard swimming meet. Specifically, it is a 100 m race using only the butterfly stroke, one of the four strokes you see at swimming meets, along with breaststroke, backstroke and fr...

Butterfly Stroke Rules

The butterfly stroke you know today first appeared in 1934 with an arm movement called the butterfly arm pull. The following year, according to Mary Donahue, a physical education, biological and health science instructor at De ...

Progression in the Butterfly Stroke

Many swimmers find the butterfly stroke the hardest to master. When swum correctly, this strenuous stroke burns more calories than any other competitive swimming stroke, at a rate of about 150 calories per 10 minutes, according...

Drills for the Butterfly Stroke

Drills for the butterfly stroke build physical endurance as well as an understanding of how the different parts of your body contribute to propelling you through the water. Your core creates the power for the butterfly motion o...

Techniques for the Butterfly Stroke

The butterfly refers to a swimming stroke that is commonly featured in organized relays and individual races, including the Olympics. The butterfly stroke remains one of the most difficult maneuvers as you have to incorporate a...

Butterfly Stroke Training

Rarely will you see a weekend warrior swimmer swimming butterfly in the lap pool. Instead they may opt for freestyle swimming or the breast stroke. The butterfly stroke requires technique and skill to propel your body through t...

Butterfly Stroke Tutorial

A difficult but often fun stroke, the butterfly stroke is one of the last strokes taught to swimming students in many programs. This stroke requires a great deal of energy and thus serves primarily as a stroke for competition s...

Competitive Butterfly Stroke

The butterfly stroke combines a dolphin kick with an arm stroke that reaches up and over the surface of the water and then under the chest in a circular rhythm. The stroke gets its name from the arm movement, which resembles th...

Swimming and the Butterfly Stroke

The complex swimming stroke known as the butterfly stroke requires strength and refined technique to be executed successfully. The stroke is characterized by the undulating motion of the body through the water and the use of bo...

The Butterfly Stroke & Breathing

The butterfly stroke is one of the most advanced swimming strokes and provides a great workout in terms of both aerobic exercise and strength training. Before you can add the butterfly stroke to your workout routine, it is impo...

Butterfly Stroke for Beginners

The butterfly stroke has a reputation for difficulty. Many swimmers, including beginners and experienced swimmers, have trouble learning and mastering this difficult stroke. Focus on certain basic tips as you practice the strok...

What Muscles are Used Swimming the Butterfly Stroke?

Swimmers are known for their strong shoulders and V-shaped bodies tapering to slim waists and hips. The butterfly stroke is a swimming stroke that involves the simultaneous use of the arms while the legs closely resemble the mo...

5 Things You Need to Know About the Butterfly Stroke

You rarely see the butterfly stroke on a lazy Sunday afternoon at the swimming pool. Rather a swim team practices the complicated stroke for swim meets. This is probably because the butterfly, or "fly" as it's sometimes called...