SWIMMING.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LIV, Issue 13575, 5 December 1907, Page 2

SWIMMING.

There appears to be an epidemic of bath-building throughout the Dominion at present. The Auckland City Council have just accepted a tender of ovor £4000 for therconstruction of salt-water baths at Shelter Beach. Christchurch is building a large tepid bath, Wellington is threatened with the enlargement of the To Aro Baths, and Dunedin is agitating for municipal baths. In addition to these a number of smaller places are pushing on with plans f. r bathing places, and Masterton at last has commenced building. B. C. Freyberg, the young Wellington swimmer, proposes during this season to swim from Thorndon to Day's Bay, a distance of about eight miles. A private letter received in Wellington from Auckland states that Champion is swimming very well at press at. C. M. Daniels, the famous American and world's champion swimmer, has th« following to say about the crawl stroke : — "There are as many varieties of the crawl nowadays as there are swimmers using it; No two swim it alike; and almost every one exhibits a method of his own. This individual adaptability must eventually produce good fruit, and it is probable that as the swimmers discover the scientific points and drop the faults in the end the different styles will bo condensed into one standard stroke. To learn the American crawl start with the arms. In fact, you will probably do well not to use the legs at all until you can swim about fifty yards with your arms only. Lie flat on tho water, with the arms a little bent at the elbows and stretched out above your head. The wrists should b,e just beyond your head and open a little, the palms of the hands turned downward. Catch the water with a decided snap, and drive the hands through at a brisk pace, always bent at the elbow, until they reach the hip; then lift them clear out of the water and carry them forward, with elbow well up in the air. The under arm is started just as the upper arm finishes. For the kick, move the legs up and down alternately, keeping them stiff at the hip and holding the knees close together. There is little difficulty in learning this if one knows how it should be done, but the best way afifer reading the description is to watch it in action. To imitate it without having read it up is not easy, and to acquire it without * seeing it is harder still, but with the help of both a few days of practice will be sufficient. Don't opon the feet more than twelve or eighteen inches from heel to toe. The real difficulty in the crawl is in working the arms and legs into a smooth stroke, and also in learning to hold tho tiring leg drive over a given distance. Both are a matter of practice. The position of the body in the crawl if flat on the face. There should be hardly any rolling, and breath should, be .'taken only every two or, three strokes by a quick twist of. the head as the, upper arm is being brought down. The time for exhaling is as the .junder arm, goes forward. When the crawl is swum slowly, as it is over the distances, the arm stroke is lengthened, and the legs are slowed according to the length of the race. In this case a breath is taken at every stroke."