Advantages
The principal advantage of the double push is that it allows the skater to generate propulsive force during a part of the stroke cycle which was previously wasted. In the glide phase of the classic stroke, friction from road and bearings tends to slow the skater down, yet the deep knee flexion during this part of the cycle fatigues the muscles. In DP he can do useful work in this time instead. This is beneficial to his muscles and also helps him to keep his speed more nearly constant instead of surging ahead and then slowing down repeatedly.
The DP extends the effective stroke length. One of the best ways to go faster is to push further in each stroke, but whereas traditionally this requires sitting lower (restricting blood flow and increasing lactic acid production in the muscles), in DP the same leg at a higher bend angle can achieve a longer effective stroke by pushing both inward and outwards.
Read more about this topic: Double Push
Famous quotes containing the word advantages:
“For, the advantages which fashion values, are plants which thrive in very confined localities, in a few streets, namely. Out of this precinct, they go for nothing; are of no use in the farm, in the forest, in the market, in war, in the nuptial society, in the literary or scientific circle, at sea, in friendship, in the heaven of thought or virtue.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“No advantages in this world are pure and unmixed.”
—David Hume (1711–1776)
“A woman might claim to retain some of the child’s faculties, although very limited and defused, simply because she has not been encouraged to learn methods of thought and develop a disciplined mind. As long as education remains largely induction ignorance will retain these advantages over learning and it is time that women impudently put them to work.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)