BODYSUIT ISSUES
From Dr. Larry Weisenthal [06/11/00]
The Fastskin/bodysuit debate has been (to me, anyway) fascinating.
If I can summarize, there appear to be about four different viewpoints.
To the above list, I will add a category 4a, which includes perhaps only me:
4a. #4 above summarizes our feelings; but the worst case scenario is so bad that we must take all necessary action to prevent the worst case scenario from playing out.
I would like to offer my opinion that the majority of swim coaches and swim officials and swim journalists who support the sport fall into category #4. I base this on a small, but I think representative sample of personal conversations. I also think that the majority are quite nervous about this, and, under other circumstances, would be moving rapidly to join me in category 4a.
However, let us first talk viewpoint #2. I emphatically do NOT agree that these suits are part of a natural progression of technical improvements in suit design and manufacture. Rather, they embody a completely new and radically different paradigm.
The previous paradigm was as follows: Fabric (any fabric) creates drag and is a hindrance to swimming performance. Therefore, reduce fabric to a minimum and make it as "invisible" as possible. Thus, when I look at pictures of swimmers even 20 years ago, it is almost quaint to see fully covered bottoms in the men and horizontal (non-"French"-cut) swim bottoms in the women. Likewise, the progression of wool to nylon to Lycra to "paper" was all part of a natural progression to progressively reduce drag, or to reduce the FABRIC IMPEDIMENT to swimming performance.
Six years ago, I bought my then 10-year-old daughter the first of her many Aquablades. This suit, with its zip-up back, had more fabric that the traditional paper racing suits, but we all interpreted this as a drag-reducing suit, in the sense that the high collar served to reduce the "scoop" (water-catching) effect of the traditional neckline. It never dawned on any of us back then that the fabric itself might offer less resistance than shaved skin. We certainly never considered the idea that more fabric could trap more air molecules and influence floatation. In her first meet with this suit, my kid dropped her time in the 100 meter fly by nearly 5 seconds, winning the Southern California Swimming Junior Olympics in a National Reportable time, and outswimming the junior version of star-of-the-future Kaelyn Keller. Therefore, I plead guilty to having a long history of giving too much credit to swimsuits for performances in the 100 fly.
Anyway, I was incredulous to see the exact same, black with red trim Speedo Aquablades with the zip up backs start to appear on MEN at master's competitions.
What on earth gives? Besides looking silly, don't these guys realize that skin offers less resistance than fabric and can't they tighten their drawstrings around the waist if they want to reduce water scooping?
Then the thighsuits emerged at around the '96 Olympics. ugly, ugLY, UGLY, I thought. This cannot work; it is a fad that will surely pass. First time I got worried was hearing a comment that they might have a tiny floatation effect, helping the hips ride higher in the water. Nevertheless, it seemed that this would only be inconsequential. In addition, the price of the thighsuits was at worst a two-fold increase. There are so many more important things in life to worry about than this.
However, the Fastskin clearly shows where all of this is headed. The paradigm of the last 100 years has now been clearly changed. The idea is NOT to reduce fabric and reduce the drag caused by the fabric. The idea is to use the fabric and the suit to ENHANCE the performance beyond that which would occur with a totally nude human body (say, with appendages strategically bound in some fashion).
The idea, in short, is to change swimming from a sport in which equipment is incidental to performance to a sport in which equipment is central to performance. To take swimming out of the company of running and to place it into the company of cycling. Cycling is a sport in which the winner is often not the best athlete but the one with the superior equipment. The focus of the athlete and coach must be equally spread between the procurement of the best equipment, and producing the best training and technique in a sport.
Now, as stated before, I know - deep in my heart I know - that the majority of coaches, swim journalists, and swimmers themselves (if they understood the issues) would agree with me that the "new paradigm" is not where the sport should be going. However, the silence is truly deafening. Why?
Here's how Warnaco (the "Calvin Klein Company" which owns Speedo) describes Speedo:
They do not state the following, but they are also, by far, the major advertiser in all of the swim publications, including the official swimming publication ("Splash") of USA Swimming.
In addition, as noted, Speedo is a sponsor of innumerable individual USA Swimming Clubs, college teams, coaches, and top swimmers.
Comment: Speedo is not an evil empire, but it is very much a bottom line driven international clothing conglomerate which has achieved a position of immense power within the governance of the sport. Speedo executives are judged by their (Calvin Klein) parents, not based on what they do which is good for the sport of swimming, but based on how they increase their revenue.
There is nothing at all wrong with them doing this. It is the system under which all of us have the best opportunity to prosper in our daily lives.
However, imagine analogies: If a single company (or even a single industry) made all of the political donations, who would be left to speak for the good of the people?
Who is left to speak for the good of the sport?
Return to Table of Contents for The Bodysuit Problem.