Open Practice with Todd DeSorbo: Short-Course Speed, Underwater Kicks & Max Effort for the 100m

with Todd DeSorbo,
University of Virginia Head Coach;
2024 US Olympic Swim Team Women'ss Head Coach (Paris);
2x USA Swimming Foundation's Golden Goggle Coach of the Year (2024, 2025);
2025 ASCA George Haines Coach of the Year;
2x Swammy National Coach of the Year (2021, 2024);
Six Straight NCAA Women's National Championships (2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025, 2026);
Five Straight CSCAA Women's Coach of the Year Awards (2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025);
8x Women's ACC Championships (2018, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025, 2026);
5x ACC Women's Swim Coach of the Year (2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024);
2021 US Olympic Swim Team Assistant Coach (Tokyo);
North Carolina State Associate Head Coach from 2011 to 2017
Helped the Wolfpack men capture three consecutive ACC titles and the women win the 2017 ACC title;
University of North Carolina Wilmington Assistant Coach from 2007 to 2011
Cape Fear Aquatic Club (NC) Coach from 2005 to 2007
College swimmer for Kentucky and University of North Carolina Wilmington

In this video, you will get an inside look at Todd DeSorbo’s 100m training program.

100 Specialty Training
After a short warm up, Coach DeSorbo begins practice with an extended fly kick set with drag socks. The focus is to build strength, power and lots of endurance. DeSorbo asks the athletes to drive their heels down and hard while being fast.

In the second part of the practice, the athletes use tempo trainers and fins for fly kick work. The focus is to generate more power on the lower tempos and to generate more speed on the high tempos.

The athletes then do rounds of underwater fly kick work with drag socks. The athletes kick on all four sides to strengthen the different aspects of the fly kick.

The athletes then remove the socks and blast two underwater 25’s to transition the power into speed. The focus here is to generate power and force while they are fatigued. The legs are tired at the end of the races and this practice will help the athletes learn to overcome their fatigue while racing.

The practice moves to power development while using parachutes. This practice is two rounds of a progression from underwater fly kick through the breakout.

The athletes do a series of efforts that help the athletes develop 1^st stroke power through super short explosive efforts trying to get as much power out of 2 full strokes.

Lastly, DeSorbo has the athletes go as fast as they can with 2x25 blast. They focus on optimal underwater kick counts and stroke counts that they are going to do in their races.

Afterwards he leads them through an active warm down. The practice concludes with four maximum effort swims.

This is an excellent inside look at Todd DeSorbo training his swimmers with a variety of proven methods and exercises designed to reinforce and grow front-end speed and endurance!

56 minutes. 2025.