Today I went back to Lake Pflugerville, a very small man-made lake, and tested the Merfluke. It was a major disappointment, although it is no worse that my previous attempts. Basically, I was really slow.
I swam about 200 meters (across the lake) in open, choppy water, and then back. In open water it is very difficult to tell how fast you are going (the lake was generally not clear enough for me to see the bottom, which might have been a reference point.) I suspect I could have swum it faster without fins at all, doing the freestyle crawl.
As in the past, my "downstroke" or power stroke, where I am kicking downward with my thighs, felt strong. I could feel the water rushing past my face. Unfortunately my recovery or "upstroke" seemed to actively slow me down. By using extreme toe flexure I could avoid this, but I couldn't sustain that for long. I then more or less moved to a "relaxed" upstroke with relaxed feet, which tended to let my feet come off the pedals. I definitely couldn't keep my heels on the heel stops that I created just for this purpose.
This is very disappointing, because it leaves open the question of whether good foot contact would allow me to go faster.
I suppose that the only thing I can do now to try to address this is to build a new set of pedals, going back to tight neoprene foot projects. This is a major setback. Once I have solved it, success will still be very uncertain.
This is the way real invention works: frustration on top of impediments fertilized by setbacks based on failures. At least that is what a great, noble-hearted and persistent inventor would tell himself or herself, so I'm sticking to it.
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