How to fix an asymmetrical pull in swimming

You’ve probably noticed, and you may have been told, that one of your arms is more effective than the other at creating propulsion. You may even have tried to do something about it and struggled to make it happen.

While you’ll never be able to achieve perfect symmetry, evening out any major differences between your arms can significantly improve your performance for two reasons.

The most obvious reason is that if one pull isn’t as effective as the other, that means you’re not creating as much propulsion as you otherwise could. Improving the pull will allow you to create more propulsion and more speed.

Just as importantly, if one pull is a lot more effective than the other, it’s going to be a lot more difficult to swim straight. You’ll either be constantly course correctly, or you’ll be swimming a whole lot more than you need to!

• 15 key front crawl swim drills to improve your technique
• How important is technique when it comes to swimming?
• 22 steps to a better triathlon swimming technique

Getting symmetrical

The most obvious solution for improving a weaker arm pull is to just think about what you’re doing with greater intention.

While that’s not a bad strategy, it also demands a lot of your attention. And as soon as you start increasing the pace or the effort, it’s going to be a lot more difficult to keep your attention where it needs to be.

What’s more, it’s not always clearly exactly how well you’re doing because you won’t be getting a whole lot of feedback from your arms.

We can change all that with one simple strategy: swimming with one paddle only. The goal here is to try to make your arm pulls as symmetrical as possible, and the rhythm of your stroke as symmetrical as possible, even though one ‘hand’ is going to be a lot bigger than the other. This is going to hold your attention much more effectively than ‘thinking’ about it.

And because there is a big difference in the surface of the hand and the paddles, you’re going to get much clearer feedback about how symmetrical your pull is.

With better and clearer feedback comes faster and more effective learning. While your initial thought might be that the paddle arm is getting worked, it’s actually the pulling arm with the free hand that’s going to be challenged.

You are going to have to work really hard to make the free hand pulling arm as effective as the paddle pulling arm. The closer you can keep the two arms in terms of effectiveness, the better.

While you may not get there, any progress is going to contribute to a better pull. I strongly suggest that you use this strategy for both sides of your body. Doing so will improve both arm pulls as well as helping to building symmetry between the arms.

Here are more swimming aid to enhance your training:

• Best swim hand paddles for swim training
• Best swimming watches to help you improve in 2024
• Best swimming snorkels for focusing on your form