“I’d like to swim without pain.”

If you swam growing up but are plagued by shoulder, back, neck, elbow, knee or other joint injuries there might be several reasons why: You might need to learn how to swim in your new body (because we all change as we mature). You might need to swim with your core instead of your arms and legs. Or you might be moving your arms, legs, or body in ways that work counter to the design of your muscles, tendons, and joints.

Because you are swimming in pain, we first need determine what’s causing the pain. We suggest starting with a Swim Assessment. A Swim Assessment is a one-on-one 75 minute lesson where you and a member our coaching staff assess your current technique, speed and training. The session will include video taping from 6 different angles (including under water), training analysis and goal setting (including racing plans). We will trim the video clips and add annotations to help you remember what to work on when you leave the Swim Studio (to see a sample Swim Assessment, click here). Some swimmers have found it useful to take the CD into their physical therapy sessions to review the content with their PT’s.

If you’d rather start right in a clinic or with a series of swim lessons, most high school swimmers follow one of the sequences below, depending on which stroke is causing you pain.

If you are experiencing pain when you swim freestyle, your track is (click on any class for a more detailed description):

• Freestyle 1
• Freestyle 2
• Freestyle 3

If you experiencing pain when you swim the other strokes, your track is (click on any class for a more detailed description):

• Backstroke 1
• Butterfly 1
• Breaststroke 1

We’ve taught many students using this track, including Kim, a former high school swimmer and now a Masters Swimmer and Triathlete. Kim came to us unable to swim freestyle and butterfly without extreme pain in her shoulders after a 90 minute workout session. After taking a series of lessons with us and practicing the refinements on our Masters Team, Kim no longer swims in pain. In fact, she recently raced the 200 Butterfly at the Illinois Masters State Meet.