Crawl Technique

Question
Dear Coach Weber,

I've been having a lot of trouble with the crawl stroke.
I've been inhaling quickly through my mouth on the side and breathing out slowly through my nose underwater.
I've been doing - Stroke, Stroke, Breathe (breathing alternate sides).  I've been trying to keep my ear in the water when I turn to the side to breath so my head does not come up causing my feet to go down in the water.  i try to roll with each stoke.  However I still manage to get water in my mouth sometimes when I go to breath in on my side which wrecks my rhythm and stroke.
Also, I was trying to kick my legs slowly with each stroke cycle, e.g. kick my right leg when I pull with my right arm.  However my arms and legs are not yet coordinated and my body gets confused.  I had to stop kicking more often because I was getting rapidly exhausted so decided to try to kick very slowly with each stroke so I would have some energy. (I'm 54).
Is this the hardest stroke to learn Coach?  I'm having a difficult time with it.  Are there any videos/DVDs you'd recommend I watch to try to learn it better?
Thanks for all your kind advice.


Answer
Michael--
Sorry it took so long to get back to you.
Let's start with the kicking problem.  If you are going to kick one time with each arm stroke you should be kicking on opposite sides(rt. leg/left arm, left arm/rt. leg), this should accomplish 2 things.  It should make the breathing a little easier and eliminate the coordination problems.  Ideally you should use a kicking tempo/speed of 4 kicks per arm cycle(rt. arm/left arm), kicking slower actually makes the stroke harder to do, crawl is actually a very easy stroke to perform, if you have questions and swim at a  public pool, have one of the lifeguards watch, they can probably give you some tips.
As for the breathing problem, try to keep looking forward while swimming, don't look directly at the bottom, this will create a small "valley" when you turn your head to breathe hopefully that will correct that problem.
It sounds like you are doing just about everything else just fine, it just takes practice.
George