Recommendation July 30
I would like to recommend you 2 books that I have been reading and have helped me a lot during my triathlon training.
1. Total Immersion Swimming: The Revolutionary Way To Swim Better, Faster and Easier by Terry Laughlin
I have never been good in swimming. I could hardly swim for 50m non-stop. Then I heard about this book and bought it immediately. After reading the first few chapters, I felt that I could actually learn to swim properly using the front crawl (freestyle) technique. So I started the drills. Initially, they were pretty boring, but they helped a lot in terms of balancing and being at “one” with the water. It took me many months before I could swim freestyle. During the A Famosa Tri, I was not good at it yet, and struggled throughout the swim. Recently at the PD Tri, my technique was better and manage to swim through leg without much trouble and with plenty of energy at the end of the swim. There is still a lot to do, especially in my technique, but I know I am going in the right path.
Link: Total Immersion
2. ChiRunning: A Revolutionaly Approach to Effortless, Injury-Free Running by Danny Dreyer and Katherine Dreyer
This is another great book. In a nutshell, what most of us have been doing was what he calls “Power Running”, where the only way we could go faster was to work harder using the legs. But then, many of the elite runners, especially the Kenyans, use a different technique with is similar to ChiRunning. They use a forward lean method where they let gravity pull them forward! With this, you don’t really have to use your leg muscles that much. I have tried ChiRunning, and I have to say it really works! Previously, my legs couldn’t cope with my body, now my body can’t cope with my legs!
Link: ChiRunning
The books might be available in your local bookstore. If not, you can try getting them from the following online stores (I am in no way affliated with any of them, nor get any profit out of this)