Product Review: TYR Burner EBP Fins

I was so excited to try out my new fins yesterday.  I haven’t been able to swim much in the last week because I have been feeling pretty crummy.  I was feeling better AND I had new gear burning a hole in my swim bag so I made the 1 block trip to the pool and slipped on my new fins!

Let me begin by saying that I am a fan of using fins.  As a coach I often use fins as a teaching tool, sometimes to correct incorrect kick motion, sometimes as a strength building tool, and sometimes maybe just to inflict a little pain.  (Just kidding, I would hardly ever never enjoy inflicting pain.)  In my own swimming I mostly use my fins to build strength.  I also try to use them sometimes to simulate wetsuit swimming.  When I use a wetsuit i really don’t kick at all.  Most people don’t.  BUT, when I swim with a pull bouy I am much slower.  When I use my fins I get better foot flotation with minimal kicking.

My old fins are the big old bulky kind.  Not like the long scuba fins, but regular small split fin.  One of the purposes of the Burner EBP (elevated body position) fin is to simulate race cadence swimming.   From the TYR site:

The perfect fin for training at race cadence. The shorter fin-bade provides just the right amount of propulsion to hone in on the perfect stroke. The shorter cadence kicks helps build fast twitch muscle fibers throughout the leg. An ergonomic foot pocket allows for decreased levels of tendon strain with efficient strength building for the ankle.

The first thing I noticed with the Burner fin was that I had to work a heck of a lot harder.  Unlike my former fins I was not darting through the water, but I was still feeling the good burn of fin work.  The 300 kick set I did had my legs feeling like jelly.  Although I enjoyed the kick work I did with the fins, I enjoyed the swim sets much more.

Following my 300 kick set I did 2 sets of 300 swims w/ fins.  The first was my wetsuit swim (pull) set.  I am not a huge fan of my pull buoy, but I did really like pulling using the burner fins.  they allowed me to use my own natural body position (I am pretty high in the water naturally, so a buoy raises me up too high) and really worked to engage my abdominal muscles.  The 300 flew back and I loved it.

My final 300 set w/ fins was a race pace swim.  The first thing I noticed was that I was now over 600 with the fins on and my feet weren’t cramping at all.  No rubbing or foot cramps – hurray!!  The second thing I noticed was that I was working at an actual race pace rather than my flying “I really could race this fast, well, maybe – um, o-k – I would  never really go this fast without these fins.”

Now my old set of fins will be passed down to my kiddo and I will be 100% using my TYR Burner EBP fin.

*I MUST note that TYR is a sponsor of Team Trakkers.  They provide their product at a discount to our team.