"Easy to learn is the biggest misconception about backstroke—common beginner mistakes to watch out for."

•4 min read
"Easy to learn is the biggest misconception about backstroke—common beginner mistakes to watch out for."




When it comes to backstroke, many people might assume that most swimming lessons actually start by teaching kids this stroke first. Kids are often held gently by their foreheads and supported at the back of their heads, lying flat on the water’s surface as they fling their arms wide and splash their legs a few times—enabling them to glide through the water effortlessly. It almost seems like all it takes to master backstroke is a bit of courage!
Actually, this can only be considered an "over-the-back float"—it’s still far from true backstroke. Even when compared to breaststroke, backstroke is surprisingly easy to pick up but tricky to master fully.
Some people even believe that backstroke is simply freestyle swimming done backward—this perception may seem plausible at first glance, but it’s actually a wildly oversimplified and misguided view. While freestyle and backstroke share many similarities in terms of key movement techniques, the fundamental difference between swimming face-down in freestyle and lying flat on your back in backstroke significantly impacts the alignment of your body’s joints and your overall athletic performance. Understanding this distinction is essential for grasping the unique mechanics of each stroke.
1. Typical mistake #1: Pushing the water with straight arms while swimming backstroke
If this continues, it won’t be long before you injure your shoulder or elbow joint. While in freestyle, the arm movement provides the primary propulsion, with kicking serving as a supporting element, in backstroke, kicking actually becomes the main source of power, while the arm push is more of a complementary action.
Of course, this doesn’t mean the pulling power is weak—it simply means the timing of the pulling motion should synchronize with the kicking action, not the other way around. At the same time, the pulling force should always complement—and never overshadow—the power generated by the kicks.
Similar to freestyle, in backstroke the arm-pushing motion still involves a slight angle between the upper and lower arms, forming a "triangular surface" with the body that effectively "frames the water." This creates a powerful "water-trapping" effect as the arms continuously accelerate through the push phase. However, the angle between the upper and lower arms must not be too wide—excessively large angles can significantly reduce pushing power, while also increasing frontal drag due to the extended arm span.
2. Typical Mistake No. 2: Exerting too much force in the arm extension
The arm extension movement in backstroke serves two main purposes: first, it helps lengthen the body, creating a more streamlined swimming posture; and second, extending the arms forward assists in engaging the core, contributing to a "rigid" and efficient body position.
A crucial difference is that the sensation in your abdomen feels entirely distinct when lying flat on your stomach versus lying on your back—lying flat makes it much easier to engage your core, while keeping your abdominal muscles tense when lying on your back tends to be relatively more challenging.
When the arms are naturally stretched, it helps keep the abdominal muscles engaged—but going too far can actually lead to arm muscle tension while causing the abdominal muscles to relax instead.
Additionally, when extending your arms straight forward with excessive force, it’s easy to cause them to cross the body’s midline—resulting in drifting sideways or even having your palms face directly into the water, which creates unnecessary frontal drag.



3. Typical Mistake #3: Swishing Becomes Kicking
Everyone says mastering the whip kick in freestyle is challenging, but the whip kick in backstroke is actually much easier—though finding the right feel for it is still trickier than in freestyle. This advantage comes from the body’s relaxed, reclined position during backstroke.
From the perspective of propulsion efficiency, the primary reason behind the fast swimming speeds in butterfly and backstroke is the powerful kicking motion. Thanks to the advantageous direction of force generated by leg joint movements, upward kicks produce more power compared to the downward kicks used in freestyle.
However, beginners often tend to make the incorrect upward kicking motion. The key to correcting this is to deliberately practice shaking your leg instead of kicking it—specifically, learn to use your thigh to ripple the entire leg. If your ankles remain relaxed enough, your calves and feet will naturally produce a fluid whipping action. Once you’ve mastered that whip-like sensation, your backstroke technique will improve rapidly.
Note one thing: kick your legs until they’re parallel to the water’s surface—don’t continue moving upward. The key to the whip kick lies in stopping abruptly; it’s all about that sudden, reverse force. If you just swing like a whip without that sharp, counter-directional push—or without that abrupt stop—there won’t be that crisp, explosive "snap" characteristic of a true whip kick.

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