Swimming was important to me, at an age when maybe some of us are past learning these things, in discovering how much we are all capable of, if we just commit ourselves.

Ultimately, everything else I’ve learned and try to share is mechanics, or more easily comprehensible knowledge.

There are no secrets in swimming, no secret to being fitter, lighter or healthier. This article is based on the most common questions and concerns I’ve seen over the years. There are no secrets, no mystery.

1 Keep swimming

This is the most important lesson of any exercise or change program. There are no secrets in swimming, no secret to being fitter, lighter or healthier. You have to keep doing it consistently. Understand starting out that the initial motivation might not last, that there is no powerful will to drive you on. Understand that the real victory comes on the crappy Thursday evening after a long day at work, when you could give up, but instead you make yourself go for a swim instead. Sure, you can swim half what you usually do. I’ll bet you that once you actually go swimming though, you’ll start to feel better, and do more. A year of crappy Thursday nights though, when looked back on at the year-end, will wipe the memory of each and every one of them away.

Skill and talent at swimming are less essential than consistency. Those older swimmers who seem to swim so effortlessly. That’s not because of a talent or special training you didn’t get, it’s because they keep swimming.

2 Swim three times a week

At least. People ask me this question. I give them this answer. They don’t like the answer. They give up because it’s too much. Self-perpetuating problem.

Here’s the real story: Three times a week isn’t that much since swimming is technically difficult. I usually say the minimum required is four times a week. But if you are getting started, commit to three days a week, of at least 45 minutes per time.

Look, let’s be honest here. Swimming is technically difficult to become proficient at. If your only goal is some weight loss, eat less, go for a walk every day. That will work. If you would like to do those and develop a skill that will last you the test of your life, you need to start swimming regularly. Sure, you can take time off. But swimming needs to become part of your life, and for that to happen, you will have to fall a little in love with it, with the fluid expression of grace in the water, or the sound of your exhalation underwater, or the meditative aspect of developing skill and mastery.

Triathletes: This does no apply to you. You must be swimming at least four times a week. I’ve heard all your excuses, and that’s all they are.

3 Get a proper swimsuit and goggles

If you let something as simple as wearing a tight swimsuit be a constraint to keeping swimming, stop now, and let’s not waste any more time. Anything loose causes drag, which will make your swimming harder, and make you less likely to improve. Wearing baggy suits or board short is NOT like running with weights, it will not benefit endurance or strength. It will simply make your swimming worse.

I’ve seen more almost naked people of every shape that most people who aren’t a paid professional of some kind. No-one cares what I or you look like. I understand you might be a bit self-conscious or shy. That’s your first challenge. Over come that, fake it until you don’t care, and you are on your way.

And don’t even think about being a regular swimmer without goggles. They are the most important invention in the history of swimming, including any of the modern strokes.

4 Don’t eat before swimming

It’s an old wife’s tale about eating an hour before swimming will cause cramps. What it will do is start your body digesting food, and making you feel lethargic during your swim as less blood is available for exercise. Also, contrary to what almost everyone you know will tell you, you do not need to eat before exercise. if you have a normal diet, you are carrying two and half thousand calories in glycogen in your blood and liver. That’s enough for TWO HOURS of intensive exercise. Endurance swimmers like myself and other endurance athletes actually rely on this ability to perform at their sport.

5 Don’t eat after swimming

The single most important reason that swimming is often poor for weight control is that since water is colder (even a heated pool) than body temperature, it stimulates an increase in metabolism in an attempt to increase core temperature. This leads people eat too much after swimming. This drives an increase in appetite. You are not hungry from the exercise of swimming (for beginners), you are hungry from thermogenesis, the internal metabolic production of heat. Teach yourself to ignore it.

6 Breathe out underwater

If swimming has a secret, it’s this. You have no idea how many times I get asked about breathing difficulties. A common phrase I hear is “I’m a good swimmer, I just have difficulty with the breathing“, whereas those two are mutually exclusive. Exhale with your face underwater. Try and do it in a controlled fashion rather than a sudden explosive breath. Keep doing that.

Here’s an actual trick to help: Hum . If you hum while your face is underwater it will help control your breathing and exhalation.

7 Get some technique advice You’ll notice how little of the above has to do with actually swimming. This bit is about swimming. If you are the kind of person who can stay at something because it’s difficult to master, swimming is perfect for you. I could say get lessons, but all you really need is someone who knows about swimming technique (a good swimmer, maybe a lifeguard, maybe not) to look at what you are doing, and then make changes according to what they tell you. You cannot figure this out for yourself. I am always happy to help someone who might ask. Other experienced swimmers are the same, because we all got here the same way, with the help of others watching us, telling us what we are doing wrong.Lessons or coaching are great, but I don’t like spending your money for you, and you can improve this way. You improve by finding out what part most needs to get better, then doing drills to correct that. Beginners hate drills because they feel slow and often unproductive. So they don’t do drills. Which is why some people can actually swim for 10 (or in the case of one guy in my pool|) 20 years, and never improve. Here are a couple of the best drills for front crawl (aka freestyle). I’m not involved in any of these videos, I simply did a YouTube search 1. Side drills . Slow, boring, but the most important drill of all. These help with balance, rotation and the all-important breathing. You start this with your arms by your side or one extended in front. Do a couple of lengths of each. Then start to add a rotation and one arm pull . Eventually move to doing a rotation and pull every 12 kick strokes 2. Raise your legs . Wall kicks are really good. Legs too low in the water are the second biggest problem after inability to breathe. The main causes are lifting your head too much, poor ankle flexibility and bicycle kicking from your knees instead of hips. I’m going to give you another easy tip: Clench your butt cheeks together. This will reduce your ability to kick your lower legs, and will start to raise your body to be more horizontal.

3. Fist drill . This is a stable of most experienced swimmers toolbox. It’s difficult, frustrating, slow, feels horrible …and immensely valuable. Swim some lengths of front crawl with your hands in fists instead of open, then go back to swimming normally. It will have all kinds of positive effects, mainly you will start to use your forearms for propulsion which will improve your position, and reduce drag.

There are hundred of drills covering all aspects of your stroke. Try to spend the first ten minutes of every swim doing these above, and add/substitute some more depending on what feedback you have on your stroke.

8 Understand lane etiquette

Following basic lane etiquette is the swimming equivalent of putting the weights backs on the rack, wiping down the bench, or putting the flag back in the hole. (I guess, I don’t do any of those sports, “I don’t even lift, bro“). Swimmers like swimmers. If you understand and follow etiquette, which lifeguards and pool management don’t in general understand, you can swim in a lane with people of differing speeds and do so comfortably for everyone.

9 Use the clock

A very common mistake for new swimmers is mixing up shortness of breath with exertion. People take rests that are far too long. The primary use of the pace clock in most pools is not purely to time fast swims but to ensure you are swimming on a consistent interval. So you can use it to time your rests. For most people for most swims, rest shouldn’t be longer than 30 seconds, and better to only take 20 seconds.

10 Warming up is more difficult than you realise

Unlike the way action films portray effort, humans require a period of increasing physical load to enable our hearts to beat faster and provide more oxygen to sustain more effort. The warming up phase has us feeling sluggish and unfit, until our hearts can provide the necessary oxygen. Once warmed up, you will swim harder, faster and better.

People not familiar with exercise are often actually put off by this phase. They sweat, (a weird tingling feeling in water when you experience it first) and can’t get enough air. It feels so horrible, that it’s actually dispiriting, and so uncomfortable for those unused to it, that it often cause them to not want to experience it again. Especially as you get older and it takes longer for your heart rate to rise (it typically takes me about one kilometer or twenty minutes to feel warmed up).

Don’t make the mistake of thinking that how you feel in the first first five or ten minutes is all you are capable of, that your body adjusting in the way it is evolved to, to be able to provide you the air for your muscles and hence