Intracycle Velocity Variation in Swimming: A Systematic Scoping Review

Abstract

Intracycle velocity variation is a swimming relevant research topic, focusing on understanding the interaction between hydrodynamic propulsive and drag forces. We have performed a systematic scoping review to map the main concepts, sources and types of evidence accomplished. Searches were conducted in the PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science databases, as well as the Biomechanics and Medicine in Swimming Symposia Proceedings Book, with manual searches, snowballing citation tracking, and external experts consultation. The eligibility criteria included competitive swimmers’ intracycle velocity variation assessment of any sex, distance, pace, swimming technique and protocol. Studies’ characteristics were summarized and expressed in an evidence gap map, and the risk of bias was judged using RoBANS. A total of 76 studies, corresponding to 68 trials involving 1440 swimmers (55.2 and 34.1% males and females), were included, with only 20 (29.4%) presenting an overall low risk of bias. The front crawl was the most studied swimming technique and intracycle velocity variation was assessed and quantified in several ways, leading to extremely divergent results. Researchers related intracycle velocity variation to coordination, energy cost, fatigue, technical proficiency, velocity, swimming techniques variants and force. Future studies should focus on studying backstroke, breaststroke and butterfly at high intensities, in young, youth and world-class swimmers, as well as in IVV quantification.

Open Water Swimming in Elite Triathletes: Physiological and Biomechanical Determinants

“…Nevertheless, the VIF results in our models indicated the non-existence of collinearity or multicollinearity between the predictors. Thus, considering the results obtained in the current study and partially agreeing with previous research in swimmers 45 , triathletes must optimize their efficiency through the stroke variables (i. e. technical skills), trying to maximize the SI values.…”

Relationship between swimming speed, intra-cycle variation of horizontal speed, and Froude efficiency during consecutive stroke cycles in adolescent swimmers

“…Additionally, and using multilevel modeling (HLM), dv was not retained as a significant predictor of swimming speed. Recently, it has been reported that the dv may not be the cause of a behavior, but rather a consequence ( Fernandes et al, 2022b , 2023 ). Swimmers can increase their swimming speed in two ways: (i) by generating greater propulsive forces in a more powerful manner (resulting in lower efficiency), or; (ii) by demonstrating greater swimming efficiency ( Peterson Silveira et al, 2019 ).…”

Advances in Biomechanics-Based Motion Analysis

“…Fadillioglu et al [ 9 ] compared running patterns in novice runners vs. expert runners, and identified the key spatiotemporal and kinematic parameters indicating better running performance. In addition, Fernandes et al [ 10 ] conducted a comprehensive review on whether swimming performance is related to kinematic parameters, i.e., intracycle velocity variations.…”