Freestyle is the fastest of the four major strokes. Typically swimmer will swim the front crawl stroke. The rules for swimming competitively in the event are regulated by International Swimming Administration(FINA). This is the easiest event of them all and is where most beginner swimmers start. There are very few restrictions which makes it the easiest. It also is the easiest stroke to be rely fast in. The two main restrictions are mainly stay in your own lane and don’t touch the bottom of the pool. Of course there are a few more rules but they aren’t enforced unless your racing in the olympics. But if you get that far you will have coaches training you so I would worry about it. And a plus is that this stroke is the nicest to all of your joints and the easiest to perform.
During the first four olympic games freestyle was held in open water(1896-Mediterranean Sea, 1900-Seine River, 1904-An Artificial lake, 1906-Mediterranean Sea). But after this they started building pools 100M long just for this event. It would be built in the middle of the track for the runners. It was made like this so it was easy to keep all the events in one place. Up till the 1940s swimmers used to wear full body suits. Which was a disadvantage since it caused competitors to slow down a lot due to drag. And throughout time many new inventions were added to help the competitors cut their time. In the 1936 Diving blocks were added and in the 1950s flip turns became popular helping swimmers shave down their times. And today we see all these pools that have all these things to help with lighting, reduce drag, and reduce all turbulence in the water.
To reduce your time dramatically something you’ll need to do is keep your body straight. If your head dips you will start to angle down into the water slowing you down. If you let the hips dip you will get caught up in drag and will slow down tremendously. Kick form the hips and not the knees for two reasons. One to not destroy the knees and second to generate more power. And when you kick don’t let your feet go out of the water. You only want your feet to cause small splashes. The more your feet come out of the water the more power you are losing from your kick. Therefore your time gets worse.
Swimming Tips 