Mega Drills for Butterfly

with Coley Stickels,
TFA Pro Team Head Coach;
head assistant coach of the International Swimming League's Tokyo Frog Kings;
member of the 2021-22 US National Team;
University of Alabama Head Men's & Women's Swimming & Diving Coach from 2019 to 2020;
Indiana University Associate Head Sprint Coach - Men's and Women's Swimming from 2017 to 2019;
2018-19 Big Ten Men's and Women's Champions (first time in school history)
head coach for Canyons Aquatic Club (Santa Clarita, CA) from 2012 to 2017 where he helped lead the team to five American records, one world record, six National Age Group records and four national high school records.
Stickels coached World record holder Abbey Weitzeil (Gold & Silver medals - 2016 Rio Olympics)
14x NCAA All American with University of Arizona

Coach Stickels presents unique and highly efficient drills for training the latest successful trends in swimming butterfly. These drills are incredibly effective for today's athlete; they challenge the athlete to think about and feel what they are doing while focusing on the critical phases of the stroke.

Stickels' drills revolve around his keys to successful butterfly:

• Minimal outsweep to initiate the stroke
• Maintain low chin position when breathing
• Double-kick timing
• Dolphin kick into the breakout stroke

Stickels utilizes drill training for the butterfly to teach and train:

• Timing
• Body awareness and tactile sense
• Efficiency and distance per stroke

Stickel's drills run the gambit of complexity from basic to advanced. Each of the drills includes instruction, rationale, nuances, and demonstrations from several swimmers. Stickels also discusses the common challenges he encounters with the stroke and offers tips and suggestions for stroke correction.

Several of Stickels drills isolate arm motion of the stroke. Included in these arm movement drills are: movement and awareness drills for the catch phase that teach a fingertip down position with forward elbows, pull pattern drills, and exit drills that focus on the finish motion of the stroke that transitions into a low recovery and efficient entry.

Breathing drills included focus on executing the breath with a low chin.

Many of Stickels' drills include undulation and proper body balance in the stroke. The uniqueness of these drills is that the undulation is executed with varying arm positions of the stroke.

In terms of teaching the swimmer to execute proper timing of the two kicks per arm cycle, Stickels uses a series of drills that create kick awareness; from drills that utilize little to no kick into drills that are executed with an over kick.

Stickels believes that executing a correct breakout stroke in the butterfly is essential. He includes drills that train the transition from underwater kicking into a highly efficient breakout stroke.

All of these innovative and creative drills are immersed in instructional methodology but also many of the drills include important conditioning components that will assist a swimmer to be more confident when racing in butterfly events.

55 minutes (plus 17 minutes of Individual Medley technique). 2013.