External forces acting on a microswimmer can feed back on its self-propulsion mechanism. We discuss this load response for a generic microswimmer that swims by cyclic shape changes. We show that the change in cycle frequency is proportional to the Lighthill efficiency of self-propulsion. As a specific example, we consider Najafis three-sphere swimmer. The force-velocity relation of a microswimmer implies a correction for a formal superposition principle for active and passive motion.
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