A tri coach posted this comment on my earlier post about weak swimming pull. I thought his advice was worth a brand new post…
For perceived weakness such as you described I recommend “baby pull-ups” as follows:
Take a pronated (palms facing away) grip on the bar. Try (and initially that may be ALL you manage!) to flex your wrists without bending your elbows, to raise your torso just a tiny bit higher. This trains “firmness” in your wrists which is often absent in swimmers who feel they’ve a poor pull.
My second recommendation is to swim a length of butterfly every 6 or 8 laps once in a while (unless you swim more butterfly than that!). “Fly” is a terrific antidote to most technical deficiencies in freestyle pull.
Mark V. McDonnell
http://TriExpert.com