Performing flipturns in the butterfly and breastroke events is not illegal, so long as both hands still touch the wall like a normal open turn, though the ability to execute flipturns in this manner is difficult and rather uncommon at high-level competitions. Despite the unorthodox approach, some swimmers, such as Kenyon College’s David Fitch, are still able to do turns this way with high efficiency. For Fitch, this not only resulted in two personal bests in one day, but also a DIII National Title in the 100 butterfly, and a new NCAA DIII Record time of 46.92.
Fitch performed flipturns at all three turns with seemingly effortless speed, and blasted impressive underwaters off each wall, popping up at roughly 12.5 yards after each one. Fitch’s record performance shaved .04 off the previous Division III Record set by Washington University’s Reed Dalton in 2015, and also came as a huge personal best. In Greensboro, Fitch shaved 0.51 from his prelims time of 47.43, where he also did flipturns, resulting in a total time drop of 0.84 as his best time prior to NCAAs stood at 47.74 from Kenyon’s mid-season invite in December.
Fitch did not swim the butterfly leg of Kenyon’s medley relay, but rather led off, splitting a 47.19 on the backstroke. In the finals of the 100 backstroke, Fitch once again was champion, touching the wall in 46.66, just missing the National Record by .04. At the end of the meet, Fitch was named CSCAA Men’s Swimmer of the Year.
Last year, we reported on Ohio State’s Joe Gardner using flipturns in the 100 breaststroke at the 2018 B1G Championships. Though Gardner did flipturns on all three walls in his prelims swim at B1Gs, he opted for a slightly different strategy in finals and only did one flipturn.
A video interview with Fitch following his National Title and Record in the 100 butterfly, as well as a race video, are provided below.
Will FINA quash this?
Point 1: technically, you have to do a flip/twist, to push off with your torso pointed more toward the floor than ceiling.
Counterpoint 1: technically, most elite swimmers already do turns with feet at a “1-o-clock to 7-o-clock” angle, potentially making their body position point ceiling-ward on push-off.
Point 2: This turn seems suited for a small group of swimmers: short, flexible body, long arms, with great breath control.
Counterpoint 2: FINA sucks and can be counted on to suck any enjoyment out of the sport.
By this logic, can you flip fly to back on IM?
Yes.
Wow, his turns are really fast
The kid has crazy breath control, paired with a huge lung capacity.
Take a look at all 3 turns, especially the last turn- he doesn’t breathe on the last stroke, holds his underwater for longer than almost everyone else, AND he doesn’t breathe for his first TWO strokes.
Beast mode.
I think the rule states simultaneous two hand touch… never heard anything about two footed touch though. If you didn’t push off with two it would most likely hurt more than help
Yep, hands are the only thing discussed in the rule book.
Technically he should be pushing off the wall at worst on his side, too. Wonder if that’s noticed, or if he’s twisting while turning.
People have had to master pushing off on their stomach for flip turns ever since the idiotic lochte rule started being enforced so that’s not an issue
He swam fast, picked up ground off the walls and won because of the flip? Or because he’s the type of kid willing to do the work to time them out and train to make them fast?
Yes.
I will have to disagree here.
I was a bit skeptical in the “sure it may be a little bit faster, but the oxygen debt…” camp, but this turn looks significantly faster than the open turns and he seems to finish fine and even keep his head down the first couple of strokes off each wall. Consider me convinced
Also didn’t breathe on the last stroke into the walls either
I was skeptical when I first heard about this, but those turns looked fast!
Hope Marco swam fast too.