What effect do different feet positions have on backstroke start

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the effect that different feet positions have on backstroke start effectiveness. The aims of this study were to discover how effective four different backstroke starts were. The four different feet positions that were considered; track start under the water, feet parallel under the water, feet parallel out of the water and track start one foot in the water one out, as well as four effectiveness variables: Flight Time (FT- the time from when the last foot leaves the wall, to where the last foot enters the water), Flight Distance (FD - the horizontal distance from the edge of the pool, to where the fingertips enter the water) Height (the vertical distance gained from the water surface, to the highest part of the back during the arc phase), were measured and Speed calculated (FD/FT). Eight competitive university aged, male swimmers between 18 and 24 (average age 20.1 ±1.46) and an average height of 1.83m ± 0.052, participated in the study. Participants performed twelve starts using each foot position three times and these were filmed. Participants were familiar with the starts that were being tested and already had an individual foot preference on their start. A one-way ANOVA was carried out to test for significant statistical difference between the starts. Results stated that there was no significant statistical difference between the starts. However across all the starts there were significant correlations found between: height gained and flight time, distance gained and height gained and speed and distance gained. There was also a significant negative correlation between speed and flight time. The results also showed that three of the participants produced better results on their non-preferred foot position.