Why are so many swimmers getting disqualified at Nationals? 

watched it live and everyone in the live chat was saying "watch, another DQ". the chat went crazy when there were DQs three heats in a row

I agree with him, BUT it does seem suspicious that 3 DQ’s came from the same ref in the same lane for the same infraction

Hey Kyle, We teach a lot of breaststrokers at The Race Club. Unfortunately, because it is very hard to see from the deck and because they have not been corrected, MANY swimmers throw in a small dolphin down kick at the end of the breast kick. Using our Velocity Meter technology we have learned that there are actually three LEGAL propulsions that can be generated from the Breaststroke kick. I call them K1, K2 and K3. K1 is the big one from the insteps pressing backward with ankles pronated. K2 occurs from squeezing the legs into the body vortex and K3 occurs from lifting the legs and pointing the toes backward up into the body vortex. The latter two motions also reduce drag and help the swimmer hold his/her speed after the kick. Of the many metrics we are measuring at TRC, the percentage loss of speed after the kick peak velocity is one of the most important. Elite breaststrokers are losing 18-28% of their speed after the peak velocity from the kick. The illegal down kick that occurs with many swimmers after K3 can and should be avoided, as we see today with nearly all elite breaststrokers (not so in the past). While using video now may seem unnecessarily harsh, it is not. It is really necessary to make the call. It will force a correction in the kicking motion that is long overdue. BTW, of the three videos you show, Leon is simply changing his body direction with the pulldown, which is perfectly legal. The third video is not gray at all. Clearly a DQ. Free kick is not allowed either at the end of the breaststroke kick. Gary Sr.

Bro I hate when I get Dairy Queened 💀💀

I’m not seriously into swimming, but this came up on my feed. I had no idea about the rules regarding form for breaststroke, but it’s really interesting. Maybe you could make a video explaining exactly what the rules are for amateurs. Also for freestyle and butterfly.

As a swimmer, the DQs were really obvious. I totally agree about the delays too. Get the next heat going, review the footage of the incident ASAP and amend the results when it's a DQ. No reason to hold up the meet if the footage is saved. Just get it flagged as requiring review, and send it to an official(s) who does the reviewing, so that the regular officials can get back to checking the next heat.

Sometimes DQs look wayyy different in slow motion as well. Tonight in finals, Lily King flinched on the blocks during the 50 breast final. It was almost un-noticeable in real speed, but in slow motion it looked atrocious.

They never should’ve allowed the dolphin kick to happen before the pull-down. The entire reason they started allowing it is because it was so hard for the refs to determine if the legs dropped naturally as a result of the pull-down force, or if it was a full intentional powerful dolphin kick. So now you have people doing a dolphin kick, then still leaving the refs wondering the 2nd kick happens intentionally or not. Simple change: allow the dolphin kick ONLY during the pull-down motion. Then the refs won’t have to watch that motion so closely anymore.

man i remember watching old olympic footage of breaststroke and all these guys would spam dolphin kicks right when they dove in and it would be hidden by bubbles

Great analysis on this Kyle! Have not seen this publicly discussed as well you did here. I think your "balance" point is so crucial. In breastroke it is a high level skill since your movements are limited per stroke cycle unlike the other strokes.

The officials got trigger happy at this meet. This happened at one of my meets where the officials were calling people for having a one hand touch on fly and breast so my coaches started filming all the heats lol.

You're 100% right that the audience needs to be able to look at the questionable underwater footage

I don't swim, or watch swimming, and yet I've watched many of Kyle's videos. I can't explain myself.

They should have started critiquing breaststroke kick well before national championships. By letting things slide at lower levels, this is what you end up with since athletes were never given the appropriate feedback that their stroke needs to be fixed. Max just won NCAAs for the umpteenth time a few months ago, so I would argue this wasn’t really enforced until this meet. Sure maybe at some other meet you were at once, but this isnt the norm. From watching video multiple times, I haven’t been able to see his, or a friends kids violation. USA swimming has done a big injustice to its athletes by being overly critical at nationals but not at the lower levels.

the officials are gonna dq me from my meet last week at this point...

50 years in the sport - swam 15, coached 35 - This isn't new, Jeremy Linn '96 silver medalist dolphin downbeat every stroke- no dq? Asked Glenn Mills, he just shrugged and smiled. & Instead dq-ing Kitajima, and stripping him of Golds and WR's they retro - active change the rules. Re: Marchand' s kick. No infraction a wave ( which dolphin kick is, consists of a complete up and down cycle. He does half up, full down , half up. One complete cycle. You're missing a key component, the coaches role. Your second instance, that mini -flutter balance kick is an infraction; see Fina SW 7.5, why hasn't the coach done their job and corrected this. Grumpy old man rant over. Thx

My team was swimming a medley relay and we didn't have a very good breaststroker, so my coach told a kid to just do dolphin kicks with his breaststroke. Somehow the officials didn't notice but all the other teams were screaming at the officials to DQ.

Having officiated for over 15 years, I totally agree with Kyle on calls. However, in lower meets (ABC) and with youngsters as young as 6 years, I would still do the same calling as I would in college and high level USA swimming meets. The young swimmers need to know (along with their coaches) the rules and not let things slide. Having competed in breaststroke events, I know what to look for and I have called those infractions at lower level meets.

Thank you for covering this topic with visual examples, well done.

EXCELLENT discussion and illustrations! Thank you! 👏🏿👏🏿👏🏿

I agree with you on showing replays to the audience, keeping them engaged and in the loop is important! I also wish USA Swimming and NBC would fix their broadcast partnership. It’s annoying when Rowdy Gaines comes and goes on certain events or in the middle of an event because the lack of communication between each company. Either USA Swimming uses NBCs audio feed or they don’t - personally I’d like them to have Rowdy broadcast both 📺

Very great analysis to break it down like that, I definitely learned a good amount about DQs from this video

Upon video review, your opinions got through 👍🏼 For real though, I do wish they would show their underwater view so people could see how strictly it’s being enforced. I saw someone heat 4 of women’s 50 breast do a flutter kick mid swim that wasn’t dqed just watching the feed. The same feed you couldn’t notice what people were getting dqed for. It’s also just…if you know someone is getting dqed each heat how could someone possibly think they could get away with cheating. It’s something that doesn’t line up with logic unless it’s shown.

When I was an NCAA swim judge I remember being told I was too quick at disqualifying at lower level meets. In my opinion a judge should not "let it slide" at lower levels. How else are they going to learn? Does a baseball umpire call a pitch that is just a little bit off the plate a strike? Should he "let it slide" in little league? Should the referee in a HS football game "let it slide" when a runner steps out of bounds only by 1/2 an inch?

Great videos! Happy I found the channel, this is a god way to get back into swimming and the community. Easy sun, keep it up!!

the only thing that makes leon’s pullout questionable is that his extra “half kick” comes as he is loading up all his energy to unleash the biggest, fullest butterfly kick as he can, which should totally be legal

You make such great points here Kyle, love your vids man

Great video. I really like the idea of having DQ footage available for the audience to see, debate, consider. As a S&T official from a LSC struggling to get more parents volunteering to officiate, it really makes me wonder if something like this (a more engaged viewership and USA swimming being more open with sharing footage) could be helpful in convincing more parents that they TOO can officiate at those summer league, Club level, CBA+ meets. And honestly from the standpoint of being an official, I've often said to myself "that seemed like 1.5 dolphin kicks on that kick out" (up-down + slight up before returning to streamline) which is not at all what you showed on screen.

Those guys doing their flutter kicks at the end of their breaststroke kick getting DQ’d … why is that controversial? Flutter kicking isn’t part of breaststroke. Duh.

I agree w your final assessment: the 1st example was legal, the 2nd 2 weren’t. The 1st time I saw Leon Marchand’s pull-out, I did an instinctive double-take too. But after watching it a few times, he’s only doing 1 butterfly kick. However, the 2 other kids you showed were definitely kicking at the end of their breaststroke kicks; the 1st was doing an obvious butterfly kick, while the 2nd kid was doing a slight, but noticeable freestyle kick - even age group swimmers know better!

Nice piece.... well done! The two examples of kicking early on are clear infractions, be it deliberate or just sloppy kicking. Athletes waiting for the next heat are the true victims of long reviews. Maybe a review official or team who's only responsibility is to review via video, while the meet continues. All DQ's announced at the end of the event. As for involving the audience more, absolutely... with clear analysis and explanation of the rule... Again, nice piece!!

Thank you for explaining. I'm a huge swimming fan and I honestly can't remember seeing anything like this.

Thanks, Kyle! Good vlog! Thanks for the explanation on UW calls. Is it fair to say that this new factor is the sole/main reason for so many DQ’s in this meet? What’s next?

Think you nailed this one, Kyle. And even if you didn’t, love your approach to “controversial” topics and laying it out there.

Thank you for this vid 🤌🤝

Great content and info for the sport(s).

Kyle is here for the entertainment! His ideas on how to keep an audience engaged is really impressive

I haven't swam competitive breast stroke for.... lets just say 30 years. I was top 5 state level - have no idea beyond that. I understand that dolphine kicks were allowed during pull out. Someone even told me... multiple dolphine kicks would be OK. Back when I swam. 1 pull, 1 kick, some part of your body had to break the surface before you did another pull. Legs pretty much had to stay at the same height with each other. That little free style flutter kick would be illegal. The up and down part of the kick would also be illegal.... When I swam it had to be visible from the surface (judges) - not camera.

Kyle Sockwell x Kyle Millis collab? Also, get some nice hiking crocs for that mile!

Great analysis

The kick is almost impossible to see above the water, so they get away with it at most meets. Could it be a training error? Maybe, but these swimmers have access during training to video- my kids did in club and college.

I agree that there should be footage and commentary of the possible dq. I actually clicked off the livestream to watch something else eventually because there was no one swimming. To be fair it was an event I dont really compete (well) in

This came across my recommended feed. I’m not a swimmer and don’t really care for the sport that much, but this video was fantastic lol. I love sports overall and this was so well put together and held my attention the entire time, great explanation of what was going on. 10/10 Kyle.

I have a solution: get rid of the breaststroke in competition. While it is a style of swimming, it is the least efficient and the most stupid. Might as well add backwards running to track and field. It can get you from A to B just like the breaststroke. Walking is already an Olympic event and is also stupid. You basically have to monitor every walker every second. With running or the other swim strokes, you just them do their thing. Can't really cheat at them.

As a former USA and NCAA official I predicted this would become a nightmare when they allowed a single downward butterfly kick.

An old friend and I would compete in every type of stroke in swimming in 1st/2nd grade and she’d always get 1st and I’d always get 2nd. We both got disqualified in breaststroke for not touching the wall with both hands. We laughed to each other and said that we were still 1st and 2nd place. I eventually became a diver because I developed asthma and enjoyed flipping around and she stayed in swimming and we both went to State in high school. It’s just funny that even though we were two DQ’d 7 year olds, we laughed about it and thought of ourselves as still #1 and #2 in our heads.🤣

Here after the owenn lloyd disqualification. The length of this video is too disturbing lol

We hit 10k in day 3 finals

12:10 interesting point!! Athletes drink and eat, warm up doing specific things at a specific time to optimise their race.. when things get delayed.. and THEYRE BEHIND THE BLOCKS, it puts things out of whack. Now it might not be much, but it doesn’t take much to miss out on a p.b or a selection by 0.1.. furthermore it can be stressful for the athletes

Seen it before. If you look back far enough that exact technique has been used before by an American during a 100m Olympic final. He was medalists.

It's about time they started using cameras to review swimming decisions. There was a blatant cheat against Jessica Shipper years ago, where the overhead shot of the finish of the butterfly event at the Worlds, showed the girl who got the gold, clearly reached out and touched one-handed. It was blatant, but the officials said they don't review camera footage. What a frickin' crock. These swimmers today are professionals - they should all have their strokes 100% correct. No exceptions.

I got DQ at Jr. Nationals in the 200 IM in 1983. Back then, no movement of your legs was allowed on the breaststroke pull after a turn. I did win the 400IM and made semis in the 200 breast.

As a breaststroker, you know where every single toe is, for every fraction of a second. No "training errors", no "flaws". You know the legal kick by heart, and you have to work hard to change it. It's engrained in your essence.

The worst part is having more Rowdy Gaines filling time.

Love your idea about involving spectators in reviews

You should make a seperate video on the topic you discussed in the end of this video! If this gets seen and shared, you never know, it could have a big influence on the sport an the popularity. Because you make some very good points and have some realistic ideas! 💪🏊

I swan with someone who does freestlye kicks in between butterfly kicks, got away with it up until final world champs when there are underwater cams, annoyed the hell out of me that for all other meets, these won't/wasn't picked up because it does provide a slight advantage

Kyle just spraying the ball park with hits usually, but now he's stroking with power.. home run Kyle! swim on!

I was in the live chat for the finals only and literally, every single time there was an even slight pause in the meet, everyone assumed (justifiably) that there was another dq coming. That third dude is NOT in a grey area - it's illegal, simple and clear. (However, that freestyle-type kick actually makes your body LOWER in the water. Swimmers: try breaststroke arms and free kick. It's not fun, lol.) US Swimming needs to: 1. Make it clear to its members that the UW cameras were to be used in initiating dq's well in advance of the meet 2. Make it clear w/all specifics needed to the swimmer of why they were dq'd 3. Give the video to dq the swimmer TO the swimmer and/or coach 4. Put the dq video up for viewers later to see 5. Have refs for ONLY watching the UW video and declare a dq much faster OR announce dq's after the entire event is done so as not to delay the meet unnecessarily And coaches need to underwater video their swimmers and review it. Many, many times. The tech is there for most teams and it's obviously very needed at this point.

They have large screen so people can see from the camera angle the situation for the players in snooker helps with the excitement for the audience

I used to swim on a big team in the late 70's and I remember when I was learning breast stroke, we were not permitted to have our head go under water. Can someone tell me when the rule on that changed? Just wondering?

The kick is so different in breaststroke that it's hard to train the guys who are so strong in other strokes not to "balance" the same way. A good breaststroke kick will start with a harsh point outward and push backward and a sweeping squeeze and ends with toes pointed at the other end of the pool. It's hard to get a guy that's relied on the front of his thighs to push downward to not do that. That's why you see DQs in the IMs. Also the guy that has a closet full of medals doesn't want to hear what that one kid who only has one stroke but always beats him with it has to say.

Well I guess I had better get some underwater cameras to make sure that my 8 year old swimmers aren't using a 1 cm flutter kick that no one on the surface can possibly see. Wouldn't want them to practice it wrong for 10 years then get wrecked by future high speed electron microscopy imaging. Or, the breaststroke could have rules that don't require 8 judges and $50,000 worth of technology to enforce.

At summer league, if we see it, we call it. In our league, one of official trainers is one of the officials who was at this meet. He always drives home that we must call it now so when they move on they're not making the same mistakes.

They need to review behind the scenes while other heats go and wait a bit before the awards are presented and not make anyone wait behind the blocks

The rule is weird. Why can’t breast stroke start with dolphin kick as many as other 3? And breast stroke will not be that slow if it is allowed to do so.

I think one DQ was called for an illegal start. All I could see, after replaying it over several times, was that the swimmer's hands were used to grab and push off the starting block, which I'm guessing is not allowed. Can anyone with more knowledge confirm or explain what that particular DQ was for, if not for the hands push?

A tad confused,. Do they have a camera looking at each lane for the entire length of each race? Are there blind spots?

Oh my, never thought you can cheat in swimming

CHAT WAS A W AS USUAL!

Actually, I like the idea of dolphin kick with the breaststroke...gonna try that in the pool for a laugh.

Dawg, we reached your goal

I used to always test the limits of the refs. would tell everyone to jump early not late. it's gamesmanship.

I'm happy it's strict to let the real fast swimmers get a fair meet 😊👏 Here in Norway it's really strict for all swimmera at all meets. It's often several dq's in heats with kids 10-14 years old. I have been a judge and dq'ed several swimmers (except in our short course nationals, I didn't get to dq a single person, they swam really well). I have been dq'ed myself for early start that I didn't feel myself move at all until the start signal, aparently I moved.. must have been a muscle twitch that I didn't notice that the judge saw. 😅

i fell over and i dont know how to feel about it

Leon marchands pullout is completely legal nothing about his fly kick in the pull out is not allowed

I always thought that the dolphin kick on a turn is unavoidable, but that kick is huge. The second swimmer is clearly sneaking a flutter kick which is masked by the motion that your body makes as it moves foward. The last swimmer also has that flutter kick but isn't as pronounced as the second swimmer. I think all three should be considered DQ'd.

part of the problem in swimming is they have individual referees different for each swimmer. no consistency. the golden rule "if doubt...give swimmer benefit" but that gray area line is different for officials. they really need to just use video replay for all swimmers and decide.

As an Official I have to disagree with one of the things you mentioned. Summer league, yeah whatever. But club and high school is where these technical issues or “see what I can get away with” get ingrained and if you don’t call it it never gets corrected. Unfortunately a lot of officials don’t want to call things because they don’t want to be the “bad guy” so it slides. Also watching Leon’s pullout, I think his dolphin kick is clean. But watch his feet after he does his arm pull and see how his feet drop. In his case it’s legal because his body stays in one plane and there is no leg usage, but a lot of kids move there legs when the feed drop back down and that is a 2nd dolphin kick. Again not often called because it can be hard to see from the deck watching 5 lanes at a club meet. But becomes instantly obvious with the UW camera.

I was a swimmer and I hated breaststroke.

The rules are pretty clear. It is up to the athlete to abide by the rules and the coaches to correct the technique if it is wrong. "All movements of the legs shall be simultaneous and on the same horizontal plane without alternating movement. Alternating movements or downward butterfly kicks are not permitted" (not including the start or after a turn). Nothing needs to be changed, some athletes are trying to push the limits and they got caught.

Also btw guys you MUST balance yourself in the water in breaststroke without gaining any other type of propulsion whether it helps or not. That’s why little kids dq in breast all the time because they are unbalanced and then they accidentally butterfly kick to try and balance themselves

I got disqualified for my conference champ 400im in 2013 for a second dolphin kick on my pullout 3 heats in a row had my lane get DQ’d. This was right after a 2012 Olympics where the 200 breast champ said he did multiple dolphin kicks because everyone else did and if you were not you were not trying to win

Idk I didn’t watch much. This must be sad for the swimmers that worked so hard.

i was the breastroker in the winning 2 med relay at YNATS that got DQ they called me for a double fly kick on the pullout. It was one official who dq every breastroker when no other official was doing it. Complete inconsistency

That's just the turbulence from POWERFUL arm and body strokes moving the totally relaxed legs. The fact that they moved only PROVES they were relaxed and within rules.

5:24 Up kicks are not against the rules. Only down kicks.

Kyle we gotta get usa swimming to get some moderators In the chat 😂

6:00 I suggest to leave the "intentional" part out, because intent is hard to measure and makes the rule/line more subjective and open to interpretation.

Leon has a dolphin kick right after entering the water but difficult for officials to see because of the splash. And breaststrokes have always known this

Hello. Couple of things: first, the swimmer at 5:44 should definitely blame his coach. At that level, I’m assuming that the training involves lot of video no? This leg kick should have been flagged at par y’a des then taken care off. Second, I worked as ref for 2 seasons and just to let everyone know, you don’t really see much when you judge…so many things happen…the light, the pressure during the meet, the fact that even for a tiny fraction of seconds you blink etc …not sure judges are useful at pro level, camera should do the job

When you hear about a DQ does your mind think cheating or ill-proper form of stroke (ex: single hand touch in Br/Fly or bad back to breast turn)

May be I did it too, in late 90 we, I grabbed n floated

I bet if you are waiting to get on the block while the underwater judges are deciding if someone in the heat before had DQ’d, I bet your nerves go through the roof. Which effects your swim.

So many people were slandering your username in the chat

Relating to the cheating you talked about at 4:36, man I was watching the world championships and the italian breastroke swimmer of the 4x100 mixed IM relay was doing exactly that! I was baffled when in the end the relay was not DQed and the Netherlands relay was Dqed because Kira Toussaint did a couple of dolphin kicks on her back in the freestyle leg... Man it was obvious he was doing a dolphin kick...

Can it be intentional DQs?🤔 You can not swim slow to save power to other start, but you can DQ yourself. Just a thought

If they have underwater camera why don't they just have a large screen and show the swimming same time as it's happening so that the people watching know what the reason is for the DQ and they have seen it on the screen so there's no reason for a delay in the next race everyone will have seen it would be better for most of the ones watching because they would not be guessing what went on underneath the surface of the water

Hello Kyle, very good analysis and suggestions! Where are you in Texas? We are from Cypress 77433 and I would like to get in touch with you for some training tips

Allowing a dolphin kick on a pullout was the dumbest rule ever.