Mathematical Basis for Modeling Swimmer Power Output in the Front Crawl Tethered Swimming: An Application to Aerobic Evaluation

Abstract

The purposes of this manuscript were to discuss the propelling hydrodynamics in human tethered swimming, and its application to strength evaluation and to approach power-time limit model (P-t_Lim) in tethered-crawl (Pu_Teth-t_Lim). Physiological and mechanical characteristics of tethered and free swimming have shown to be very similar, and thus tethered swimming is a reliable condition for evaluation and training. Hydrodynamics assumptions for hydrofoil in free swimming were applied for tethered swimming to support the power-time limit model reproduction. Critical power in crawl-tethered (Pu_TethCrit) was shown to be closely related to the critical velocity determined during free swimming and performance of competitive distances ranged from 200 to 1500-m. These results recognize the Pu_Teth-t_Lim model as a suitable method to reproduce P-t_Lim model in swimming, but the reliability of the Pu_TethCrit as an index of aerobic capacity, and training intensity must be explored in further researches.