I Need Help with a School Project

Question
I need information on competitive swimming about the skills, strategies, rules, guidelines, safety(warm ups and cool downs), fitness components, and energy systems! Can you please help me?

Answer
Tiana,
Thank you so much for writing.  I am sorry that it took so long for me to reply.  I was away on business.  I am back now!

I can answer some of your questions or put you in the right direction.  I do have some questions of my own though.

What class is this for?  You say "energy systems".  What specifically do you need information on?  That is very broad.

The best place to look for rules and guidelins is the FINA homepage:  http://www.fina.org/
This is the international organization that governs the aquatic sports.  You can find information on swimming by clicking the "swimming" button at the top of the page.  FINA's rules pretty much coincide with the rules/guidelines of the USA and all other major swimming countries (including Australia and England).  FINA also has information on skills, etc.

USA Swimming also has a lot of information on their site:  http://www.usaswimming.org/

As for strategies, what are you looking for?  Strategies on training?  Strategies on competition?  There are many different strategies for each race in competitions.  The way I swim a race is different each time depending on my goals.

I can give you a lot of information on training though.  You asked about warm ups and cool downs.  Let me talk about that.  It's imperative to stretch fully prior to any workout.  Swimming really stresses the shoulders, back, and abs.  It's a good idea to stretch those areas of your body.  For a warm up, it all depends on what the practice is going to entail.  Traditionally a good warm up for elite athletes is going to be about 1000 yards.  This will be a mixture of strokes and drills to get blood flowing into all major muscle groups.  At the end of warm up, the swimmer should be ready to train at peak levels.

Warm down is very similar.  The idea is to decrease the heart rate to resting level (or close to it).  Also, you want to work the lactic acid out of you muscles.  That is a major point most people don't realize.  Lactic acid builds up in your muscles and causes pain and fatigue.  You want to make sure you slowly move the mucles you just strained in order to work out the lactic acid.  A good warm down will ultimately depend on each individual swimmer.  300-1000 yards usually does the trick depending on what type of training took place.

I hope that this helps you and/or gives you a start on what you need.  If you need any more information, please let me know.  I won't take as long to reply.  Good luck and swim hard!
Eric