3.7. Should your fingers be together or apart in crawl?

If you already have your breathing and body position under control (and even the “S” shape with a finger in your nose), you can start focusing on the finer details.
One of the common questions my swimmers ask is how far apart their fingers should be when pulling.
Should they be completely together like a small bowl? Or completely spread apart?
The correct position is: they should be slightly apart, but firm. Try setting your hand with me now: keep it gently shaped like a small bowl, but only slightly – more like a shallow plate than a deep scoop – and space your fingers about 0.5 cm apart.
Then you need to hold that position during the pull and keep the fingers firm.
Try gently pressing or tapping each finger – you should feel if you can engage each one individually.
Then test it while swimming: try doing a few strokes without breathing, or use a snorkel and watch your fingers underwater.
Watch what they do throughout the stroke.
Very often, swimmers’ fingers start fluttering and dancing underwater – and we don’t want that.
If you notice that you’re not keeping them firm and they’re waving like in the wind, then it’s better to keep them completely together.