By Olivier Poirier-Leroy on SwimSwam
Training for sprint swimmers is fairly straightforward:
Clang around some weights in the gym +
Swim like your hair is on fire in the water =
The bulkhead rocks and rattles from your speed and power.
While strength in the gym is (obviously) important, particularly for sprinters, it’s being able to express that strength in the water that matters.
And that starts with your legs.
The Legs Are a Force to Be Reckoned With
The kick is typically considered a minor player in direct freestyle propulsion, with estimates ranging from 10-15% at higher speeds. But when Morouço et al. (2015) measured tethered arm and leg forces separately, the kick accounted for roughly 30% of total propulsive force.
Okay, that sounds pretty promising. But how does leg force connect to actual sprint speed?
A study by Strzala et al. (2021) took things further, testing a group of 27 male sprinters in and out of the water. Swimmers did tethered kick, pull, and swim tests. They also did dryland tests including arm force, arm cranking power, and countermovement jumps.
The big winner for predicting 50m freestyle speed?
While the water tests outperformed the dryland tests, it was kicking force that had the strongest link to sprint swimming performance.
Swimmers that could make the tether creak and groan with their leg power saw faster times on the clock when sprinting full-stroke.
Why the Kick is the Real MVP
Freestyle kick provides direct propulsion (important) but also stabilizes the entire stroke (even more important).
Without a strong kick, arm turnover quickly enters “spinning out” territory. In the Strzala study, swimmers’ stroke rate spiked when doing arms-only compared to full-stroke swimming.
Because the legs weren’t there to anchor the trunk and provide a stable base to rotate against, swimmers compensated by spinning the arms faster. This produced shorter, choppier strokes with less effective force application.
And this matters.
Sprint freestyle isn’t just turning over the arms fast. Stroke length is still key, even if we aren’t hitting the long glide and super long DPS numbers typical of distance events.
Staunton et al. (2025) analyzed 324 swimmers at the European Short-Course Championships and found that stroke length had the strongest relationship with sprint speed for both men and women. Stroke rate alone had little or even a negative association.
The fastest swimmers weren’t blindly rotating their arms, but were pushing higher stroke rates without sacrificing stroke length. This combo demands a powerful, stabilizing kick to maintain body position at high turnover.
So the kick is a true double whammy: It adds direct propulsion and creates the conditions for your arms to work more effectively.
Take it away, and speed falls apart (not ideal).
The Bottom Line
Fast sprinting looks like white-water chaos, but it rewards swimmers who can apply force at a high level without red-lining or falling apart.
So to build a kick that:
Anchors rotation Preserves stroke length Adds meaningful propulsionUse the power tower. Pull out the DragSox. Hammer vertical kicking sets. Kick fast and kick for power.
And build a set of wheels that powers you to the finish when everyone starts spinning out.
Happy sprinting!
ABOUT OLIVIER POIRIER-LEROY
Olivier Poirier-Leroy is a former national level swimmer, 2x Olympic Trials qualifier, and author of several books for swimmers, including YourSwimBook, Conquer the Pool, The Dolphin Kick Manual, and most recently, The 50 Freestyle Blueprint.
The book is a beastly 220+ pages of evidence-based insights and practical tips for improving freestyle sprint speed.
It details everything from how to master stroke rate, technique, build a thundering freestyle kick, improve your start and underwaters, and much more.
The 50 Freestyle Blueprint also includes 20 sprint sets to get you started and a bonus guide on how to master the 100 freestyle to complete your sprint preparation.
Learn more about The 50 Freestyle Blueprint today.
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