FINA Opts To Ban All High-Tech Swimsuits

Washington Post ^ | Saturday, July 25, 2009 | By Amy Shipley

[Perdogg]

FINA, swimming's world governing body, finally figured out the way to determine which of the controversial long-length, high-tech swimsuits to restrict. On Friday, it banned every last one. With a nearly unanimous vote, FINA's member nations accepted a proposal initiated by the United States to allow only waist-to-knee suits, known as "jammers," for men, and shoulder-to-knee suits for women, beginning in competition next year.

[Perdogg]

Hoorray!!!!

[muir_redwoods]

Have them all swim without suits. At the very least it might boost viewership

[Tainan]

Nekid swimming enhances aqua-hydrodynamics

a bit redundant mebbe.

[Eye of Unk]

Ironically the first Olympics were supposedly of naked athletes.

[Daffynition]

[bondjamesbond]

What about the Burkinis worn by the Saudi Arabian Women’s Swim Team?

[Recon Dad]

Having spent many years breathing Chlorine at more natatoriums then I care to remember, both as a swim parent and swim official getting rid of the suits is the right thing to do.
My swim days ended as this era was just beginning and I had to spend some serious dough on what were called “paper suits” and I can only imagine parents trying to pay for some of the newer versions at $500 a pop.
I don't expect results will change as far as who wins or loses just that the playing field is now less expensive and technology will not factor in to a posted time.

[Rumierules]

I don’t expect results will change as far as who wins or loses just that the playing field is now less expensive and technology will not factor in to a posted time.
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Do you think that Phelps will still lose by about a full body length to Biedermann (who wore a polyurethane hi-tech suit) in his 200 free win over Phelps (who stuck with his once-revolutionary LZR Racer)?

[Recon Dad]

The FINA ban must go into effect some time soon and then we will see.

Phelps is a true phenom and I thought looked pretty good in Indy a few weeks ago. Hard to say where he is in his training cycle. I would suspect that he used the Long Course Champs and even the World as tests to see where he's at after the long layoff more than anything else. No way is he at the end of a training cycle and into a full taper.

The other aspect is the mental side. Does Phelps have the same mental drive he did prior to the last Olympics. If he does he's got one more good Olympic Games left

[RayChuang88]

I'm not surprised at the ban. EVERYBODY was worried that we were headed towards what amounted to a highly-slick version of the scuba-diving wetsuit--one that would have cost over US$1,000 per suit.

[Recon Dad]

When we were posting on this the yesterday I didn't know the significance of the suit the German was in. Having read a little on it I would still say it's about time FINA banned all suits. Below is a paste I took off an article from Drudge today. I would say Phelps answered his critics and will look to meet the German in the pool sans suits probably next long course world champs next year.

The loss—Phelps’ first in an individual race at the Olympics or world championships since 2005—was followed by coach Bob Bowman's angry tirade against the sport's governing body, which allowed polyurethane suits to be used at these championships.

FINA plans to ban all high-tech bodysuit sometime early in 2010, but Bowman said Phelps might sit out all international meets until the rule goes into effect, believing Biedermann’s Arena suit gave him a huge edge over Phelps’ once-revolutionary Speedo LZR Racer.

The bad part for Phelps might be that all the records set in either suit will never be broken without them, thus making the records tainted.

[Rumierules]

Bowman sounds kind of whiny given the fact that Phelps uses a high tech suit too, just less high tech. I don’t know how long Bowman has been on record complaining about high tech suits, but it seems Speedo just got behind a little bit and, for whatever reason, Phelps stuck with Speedo’s suit. (Apparently, Speedo gave him permission to use whatever he needed to win).