Focus on One Swimming Stroke or Compete in Multiple: How Much Specialization Is Needed to Become a World-Class Female Swimmer?
<b>Objectives:</b> To investigate performance development and variety in swimming strokes of female swimmers from early junior to elite age. <b>Methods</b>: A total of 194,788 race times of female 200 m swimmers representing 77 nations were ranked at peak performance age and...
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| Format: | Article |
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MDPI AG
2025-02-01
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| Series: | Journal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2411-5142/10/1/64 |
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| author | Dennis-Peter Born Jenny Lorentzen Jesús J. Ruiz-Navarro Thomas Stöggl Michael Romann Glenn Björklund |
| author_facet | Dennis-Peter Born Jenny Lorentzen Jesús J. Ruiz-Navarro Thomas Stöggl Michael Romann Glenn Björklund |
| author_sort | Dennis-Peter Born |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | <b>Objectives:</b> To investigate performance development and variety in swimming strokes of female swimmers from early junior to elite age. <b>Methods</b>: A total of 194,788 race times of female 200 m swimmers representing 77 nations were ranked at peak performance age and clustered into world-class finalists (>850 swimming points), international-class (750–850), national-class (650–750) and regional-class swimmers (550–650). Annual best times for each swimming stroke were retrospectively extracted throughout adolescence from 13 years of age. Longitudinal performance development and differences between the swimmers’ main and their secondary swimming strokes were analyzed using linear mixed model. <b>Results</b>: World-class freestyle swimmers show significantly (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.042) higher swimming points across all age categories compared to international-, national- and regional-class swimmers. Linear mixed model analysis indicates a significant performance progression for international- and national-class freestyle swimmers up to the 19–20-year-old category (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.038), but an earlier plateau was observed for regional-class swimmers (<i>p</i> = 0.714). Comparing main and secondary swimming strokes, freestyle swimmers show the highest degree of specialization. For breaststroke and individual medleys, specialization increases with increasing performance level and the closer an athlete is to elite age. World-class butterfly and backstroke finalists show the lowest specializations in terms of the smallest number of significant differences compared to performances in their secondary swimming strokes. <b>Conclusions</b>: Higher ranked swimmers show a greater degree of specialization. As different specialization patterns are evident for the various swimming strokes, decision makers and talent specialists should align development guidelines accordingly and base them on the most advantageous combinations of swimming strokes. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-3a37d23c53d74b2c999ec6ed7f912d8b |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2411-5142 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-02-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Journal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology |
| spelling | doaj-art-3a37d23c53d74b2c999ec6ed7f912d8b2025-08-20T03:43:39ZengMDPI AGJournal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology2411-51422025-02-011016410.3390/jfmk10010064Focus on One Swimming Stroke or Compete in Multiple: How Much Specialization Is Needed to Become a World-Class Female Swimmer?Dennis-Peter Born0Jenny Lorentzen1Jesús J. Ruiz-Navarro2Thomas Stöggl3Michael Romann4Glenn Björklund5Swiss Development Hub for Strength and Conditioning in Swimming, Swiss Swimming Federation, 3048 Worblaufen, SwitzerlandSwiss Development Hub for Strength and Conditioning in Swimming, Swiss Swimming Federation, 3048 Worblaufen, SwitzerlandAquatics Lab, Department of Physical Education and Sports, Faculty of Sport Sciences, University of Granada, 18071 Granada, SpainRed Bull Athlete Performance Center, 5303 Thalgau, AustriaDepartment for Elite Sport, Swiss Federal Institute of Sport Magglingen, 2532 Magglingen, SwitzerlandSwedish Winter Sports Research Centre, Mid Sweden University, 831 40 Östersund, Sweden<b>Objectives:</b> To investigate performance development and variety in swimming strokes of female swimmers from early junior to elite age. <b>Methods</b>: A total of 194,788 race times of female 200 m swimmers representing 77 nations were ranked at peak performance age and clustered into world-class finalists (>850 swimming points), international-class (750–850), national-class (650–750) and regional-class swimmers (550–650). Annual best times for each swimming stroke were retrospectively extracted throughout adolescence from 13 years of age. Longitudinal performance development and differences between the swimmers’ main and their secondary swimming strokes were analyzed using linear mixed model. <b>Results</b>: World-class freestyle swimmers show significantly (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.042) higher swimming points across all age categories compared to international-, national- and regional-class swimmers. Linear mixed model analysis indicates a significant performance progression for international- and national-class freestyle swimmers up to the 19–20-year-old category (<i>p</i> ≤ 0.038), but an earlier plateau was observed for regional-class swimmers (<i>p</i> = 0.714). Comparing main and secondary swimming strokes, freestyle swimmers show the highest degree of specialization. For breaststroke and individual medleys, specialization increases with increasing performance level and the closer an athlete is to elite age. World-class butterfly and backstroke finalists show the lowest specializations in terms of the smallest number of significant differences compared to performances in their secondary swimming strokes. <b>Conclusions</b>: Higher ranked swimmers show a greater degree of specialization. As different specialization patterns are evident for the various swimming strokes, decision makers and talent specialists should align development guidelines accordingly and base them on the most advantageous combinations of swimming strokes.https://www.mdpi.com/2411-5142/10/1/64competitive swimmingdeliberate practicediversificationlong-term athlete developmentsampling |
| spellingShingle | Dennis-Peter Born Jenny Lorentzen Jesús J. Ruiz-Navarro Thomas Stöggl Michael Romann Glenn Björklund Focus on One Swimming Stroke or Compete in Multiple: How Much Specialization Is Needed to Become a World-Class Female Swimmer? Journal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology competitive swimming deliberate practice diversification long-term athlete development sampling |
| title | Focus on One Swimming Stroke or Compete in Multiple: How Much Specialization Is Needed to Become a World-Class Female Swimmer? |
| title_full | Focus on One Swimming Stroke or Compete in Multiple: How Much Specialization Is Needed to Become a World-Class Female Swimmer? |
| title_fullStr | Focus on One Swimming Stroke or Compete in Multiple: How Much Specialization Is Needed to Become a World-Class Female Swimmer? |
| title_full_unstemmed | Focus on One Swimming Stroke or Compete in Multiple: How Much Specialization Is Needed to Become a World-Class Female Swimmer? |
| title_short | Focus on One Swimming Stroke or Compete in Multiple: How Much Specialization Is Needed to Become a World-Class Female Swimmer? |
| title_sort | focus on one swimming stroke or compete in multiple how much specialization is needed to become a world class female swimmer |
| topic | competitive swimming deliberate practice diversification long-term athlete development sampling |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2411-5142/10/1/64 |
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