What is the difference between FORM Score and SWOLF?
Both FORM Score and SWOLF use a swimmer's speed and their stroke length to measure swimming efficiency.
SWOLF does this by adding the number of strokes and the number of seconds a swimmer takes in a length to give you a number. However, the number of strokes you take per length can change significantly based on:
- The swimmer's pace
- The swimmer's height
- How far a swimmer pushes off the wall
- The pool size they are swimming in.
As such, it is hard to compare between people, and across different pool sizes.
FORM Score measures swimming efficiency while taking all aspects of a swimmer's length into account. FORM Score is more specific because it uses the swimmer's "distance per stroke" (the number of metres they travel per stroke) and their swimming velocity (metres per second) to measure a swimmer's efficiency. This makes FORM Score a truer measure of your swimming efficiency, and a better tool to help a swimmer improve their technique.
When you set up your FORM app account, you input your height. This, plus your pace and push off from the wall, are used for the FORM Score calculation.