Definition of "backstroke" []

• Sports A swimming stroke performed on one's back, especially one using alternating overarm strokes and a flutter kick. (noun)
• Sports A race or a leg of a race in which this stroke is swum. (noun)
• A backhanded stroke or motion. (noun)
• A stroke or motion in the direction of an original starting point: a saw that cuts on the backstroke. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• ""It's a good confidence booster to know that the backstroke is there," Phelps said."
• "In each, Ogawa deploys an precise style that maintains an eerie distance between the narrator and event, her words clinical and charged with meaning, always leading with a slow build that concludes with a twist – although backstroke is probably more apt."
• "The performances churned chatter about the Spitz standard, and Thorpe fed it by testing himself in backstroke and IM events."