World-Record Freestyle | David Popovici Technique Analysis

David Popovici broke the 100 meter freestyle world record at only 17 years old! We break down his stroke from his rotation to his kick to see how he swims that fast and how you can apply his technique to your own freestyle.

Chapters:
0:00 Intro
0:57 Hand Entry
2:40 Head Position
4:20 High Elbow Recovery
5:07 Rotation
8:03 Race Analysis

Swim Tips:

Join the Community:

About MySwimPro:
MySwimPro is the #1 fitness app for swimmers in the world! MySwimPro is a personal coach that helps swimmers in more than 180 countries improve their performance and health by delivering personalized training plans, workouts, technique videos, and analytics. The MySwimPro app is available on iPhone, Android, Apple Watch, and Garmin smartwatches.

About Coach Fares:

[laurenanderson]

As an ex competitive swimmer, his technique is beautiful and virtually flawless. He has focused on efficiency and then added the power. His technique allows him to utilise his ridiculously high power to weight ratio. Simply a very clever freak of nature.

[Magic-wosj]

Anyone here after his gold at the Olympics?

[Aaron-zkjn]

Allow me to point out a couple of things:

1. He's Romanian, not Italian so it's pronounced "Popovich"

2. Head position - It is not an "extreme version" of his breathing. When he is going at full speed, BOTH goggles come out of the water and that angle actually increases. Why do you think his head is at that angle on the breath? Because it is literally as you said; water is 800 times the resistance. He has half his body surfing over the water while maintaining a powerful kick which keeps his hips up ( he has incredibly flexible hips). It is entirely intentional. He is swimming higher in the water.

3. Rotation - you would be absolutely correct that the flatter position is slower if he wasn't actually getting a lot of his torso completely out of the water.

4. Race analysis - *46.86, not 49.86... EVERYONE will probably disagree with me on this but this is my hot take: gaining 25 lbs of muscle might actually hurt him. Yes, he will be more explosive. Yes, his start will improve. But the trade off: volume(he will be larger/wider causing a slight increase in drag) and buoyancy(increase in density = lower position in water, increasing drag further). He has great strength, but his lightness finesse, flexibility, and technique is what sets him apart. His ability to stay HIGHER in the water makes him so fast.

[scktdg]

In the meantime we are witnessing the new world record holder, I think that we have to teach the other how to swimm like him. I have read a lot of articles and watched too many videos on correcting him. I don’t understand why? With this technique, he swam the best time ever!!! The lesson that I think that all of us have to learn from what happened with this record is that EVERYONE MUST FIND WHAT IS COMFORTABLE FOR THEM. So even if you say that you have to learn from him, than you are actually wrong. He has found the best way for himself. Your job is to find your best way that gives you the best result. Read, learn, ask, but in the end, you have to find the best way that adjust you and only you.

[danaprundurel]

David Popovici is our hero! Suntem mândri de înotătorul nostru de aur!

[richlee]

The tip about his hands entering the water at an angle is swimming gold!!! Tried that in today's workout, my pull felt about a foot longer... Great insight!!

[arpadferenczy]

Great video as always! now as I´m sure we will hear very often from David in the next 10 years or more, please note that the correct spelling of his name is with a mute "i" at the end. Kind of "popo which"! Go David!

[alexcave]

Another great detailed breakdown Fares. To me Popovici seems to have a slight fly type motion in his stroke where his powerful leg kick combined with incredible hold of the water allows him to almost climb over the water for fractions of a second.

[kevinemmanuelhernandezlope]

Excelente video.
Lo estaba esperando.
Un abrazo y muchos éxitos.

[ViviBina]

Yes, Fares, please do an in-person session with David. Thanks.

[gregorygibbs]

This is an extremely helpful breakdown of a fantastic swimming technique

[DorinaDumi]

29 iulie ziua imnului national al Romaniei si a victoriei lui David Popovici Felicitari multumiri David si te iubim❤

[antokindness]

POPOVICH (as in rich)

Thanks for the video from Italy!

[redwoodrider]

Thanks for making this I’m working with my coach rn to improve my hip rotation and she suggested that I check out popvicis stroke

[robohippy]

Interesting break down. However, you still need to become familiar with the Gallop style of freestyle, which is also called by some 'Hybrid' style of freestyle. Hybrid being a combination between shoulder driven and hip driven freestyle. I will continue to maintain that hips can not drive anything, but that is another matter.... Anyway, this gallop style seems to go back to at least Mark Spitz, though his version was very coarse. Matt Biondi did it far better, and the modern swimmers do it still better. It does involve that slight upper body twisting that you pointed out and a slight porpoising while swimming. Arms come over the top slightly higher so you can drive your catch/recover forward and down for a bit more acceleration. The cadence is not even, but a quick 1, 2, then a slight pause, then repeat. Even distance swimmers like Sun Yang use it. All of the men use it, and a few women like Katie Ledecky use it. The things he does that do not fit 'classic' freestyle are due to this method of freestyle, and they contribute to faster speeds.

[laurentiup]

Please also analyze the return, is it the fastest of all great swimmers? I mean the sequence from 10.46 min. Felicitari David Popovici!!

[niallroberts]

It really is going to be interesting to see how we develops. He's still quite young and skinny, when he begins to pack on the muscle and become more explosive especially on his starts and turns we will be in for quite a treat!

[batman]

I’m both a swimmer and a fan of human movement (in a nerd kind of way - hence my presence in this comment section).

I encourage you to look up GOATA.

I actually disagree with the idea that his spine going off line, is a bad thing. All elite movement amongst mammals begins with the spine as an engine.

Fish literally ONLY use their center to flap side to side and thus move forwards.

I actually think David is onto something here which others may have historically overlooked - hence his talent

[HA-rpzo]

Nice analysis. As a former swimmer I agree
I appreciate your effort. One thing I didn't see which I would say I very important is how he keeps his hands under the water and moves them and specially his fingers.

[christiecharba]

The slow-motion footage is super! It's so helpful to better see the motion and body position:) Looking forward to swimming tomorrow!