After seeing a woman break 24 seconds and I think we can stop the discussion of "IF" the LZR suit is faster and start thinking "how much faster".
The previous line of suits (Fastskin and so on) were pretty similiar to a shaved swimmer. Sure - they do feel like they make you float, but overall the times seemed to move along "in line" with what I would expect to see in terms of improvements in the sport. If the previous suits would have been that much faster than shaving, you would have never seen people just using the legskins. By the way - for us Masters swimmers there was always the added benefit of keeping in all the "extra layers of skin".
So how much faster are the LZR suits ?
If I had to guess based on the results so far, I would say 0.25 to 0.30 per 50 and double that for the 100. I can see the Bernard going 48 low in the 100 and I can see Sullivan getting close or just breaking the 50 record. It makes sense that Libby Lenton would swim a 24.2 or so in the 50.
I think one of the top regular teams out there should do a test - you need a good amount of world class swimmers training together to be able to do a test. Here is the test I would propose:
8-10 swimmers
2 days of testing
4x50 on 10 minutes all out
Day 1 - swim 2 with a Fastskin2 followed by 2 with the LZR
Day 2 - swim 2 with the LZR followed by 2 with the Fastskin2
Get the averages of all 10 swimmers - maybe drop the high and low and there you go.
Why do the test ? I would HAVE to know. Swimming is a big part of your life and you just set a massive PR using this new technology - my very first question would be " How much was me and how much was the suit?"?
Parents
Former Member
Olympic Results are in - now we can get a clear picture on the LZR time drops:
Hope the table comes through -- 10th place in World Ranking 100 Free over the last 18 years (swimnews has an amzing stat feature now -- taking 10th place to avoid the "freak factor" and 100 Free, because it's the most competitive event in swimming (relay). If the % is negative - the 10th place was actually slower than the prior year.
Don't remember if the first Faskin suits came up in 1999 or 2000 - but there is a spike at that time -- and then of course the last 2 years. I think step one of the Fastskin Pro material and step 2 the LZR.
Also interesting to note how small the often cited "Olympic Year drop" was in 1992, 1996 and 2004.
1990 49.98
1991 49.79 0.380%
1992 49.82 -0.060%
1993 49.93 -0.221%
1994 50.18 -0.501%
1995 49.79 0.777%
1996 49.74 0.100%
1997 49.95 -0.422%
1998 49.8 0.300%
1999 49.43 0.743%
2000 49.15 0.566%
2001 49.31 -0.326%
2002 49.32 -0.020%
2003 49.07 0.507%
2004 49.07 0.000%
2005 49.02 0.102%
2006 48.94 0.163%
2007 48.63 0.633%
2008 47.83 1.645%
And before anybody says this is unique to the 100 Free - just name another event and we can check the times.
Olympic Results are in - now we can get a clear picture on the LZR time drops:
Hope the table comes through -- 10th place in World Ranking 100 Free over the last 18 years (swimnews has an amzing stat feature now -- taking 10th place to avoid the "freak factor" and 100 Free, because it's the most competitive event in swimming (relay). If the % is negative - the 10th place was actually slower than the prior year.
Don't remember if the first Faskin suits came up in 1999 or 2000 - but there is a spike at that time -- and then of course the last 2 years. I think step one of the Fastskin Pro material and step 2 the LZR.
Also interesting to note how small the often cited "Olympic Year drop" was in 1992, 1996 and 2004.
1990 49.98
1991 49.79 0.380%
1992 49.82 -0.060%
1993 49.93 -0.221%
1994 50.18 -0.501%
1995 49.79 0.777%
1996 49.74 0.100%
1997 49.95 -0.422%
1998 49.8 0.300%
1999 49.43 0.743%
2000 49.15 0.566%
2001 49.31 -0.326%
2002 49.32 -0.020%
2003 49.07 0.507%
2004 49.07 0.000%
2005 49.02 0.102%
2006 48.94 0.163%
2007 48.63 0.633%
2008 47.83 1.645%
And before anybody says this is unique to the 100 Free - just name another event and we can check the times.
