5 km front crawl in pool and open water swimming: breath-by-breath energy expenditure and kinematic analysis

Swimming with Swimsuit and Wetsuit at Typical vs. Cold-water Temperatures (26 vs. 18 ℃)

“…The current study underscored the importance of using wetsuits at 18 ℃ for open water swimming competitions, since it allows for better technique and economy of effort (compared to wearing a swimsuit), meaning that for the same energy input its use enables better performance. Also, since the anaerobic threshold pace happens at ~90 % of the 400-m intensity [18,19], the physiologic and biomechanical variable values displayed in our study could be useful for evaluating the open water swimmer and triathletes' performance, which typically happens below or at that boundary [14,15]. Notwithstanding the swimming flume particularities (that should be considered when analyzing data), its use makes the process of evaluating swimmers easier in both physiologic and biomechanical areas.…”

“…In addition, immediately after each trial, swimmers rated their perceived exertion (RPE) on a Borg scale [24]. Stroke rate (SR) was obtained measuring three consecutive upper limbs cycles, stroke length (SL) was calculated from the ratio between v and corresponding SR [14] and stroke index (SI), a measure of swimming efficiency, was calculated by multiplying v by SL [19]. Finally, ηp was estimated as follows [30]:…”

“…A K4b 2 (Cosmed, Rome, Italy) breath-by-breath portable gas analyzer which allows the direct measurement of respiratory and pulmonary gas exchange variables, being suspended at 1.8 m above the water surface (▶ Figure 1). The gas analyzer was attached to a low hydrodynamic resistance respiratory snorkel and valve system (AquaTrainer, Cosmed, Rome, Italy) [14,22] and was calibrated with 16 % O 2 and 5 % CO 2 concentration gases before each testing session. HR was measured using telemetry (Polar Wearlink, Kempele, Finlandia) synchronized with the portable gas analyzer.…”

“…Open water swimming is different compared to pool swimming since there are no turns and wall push-off glide, as the water volume is higher and water temperatures varies, leading to particular cardiovascular and technical responses [14,15]. Therefore, swimming in a flume at different water temperatures could be a good strategy to simulate the typical continuous open water swimming both during training and testing.…”

A Portable and Flexible Self-Powered Multifunctional Sensor for Real-Time Monitoring in Swimming

“…Moreover, swimming is also a self-help skill for humans and the most popular event in the Olympic games. In a swimming competition, athletes need to use their own high-quality skills under the condition of saving the most energy, which enables swimmers to extend the effective stroke time to achieve the best competition performance [ 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 ]. In swimming training, heart rate detection as a common and effective method is always used to monitor the energy consumption.…”