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?"?
Chris and Jazz,
Good luck convincing the group that the suits are not the single largest contributing factor. I think it is probably a combination of the suits, general stroke improvements, and SDKs, etc. I would just like to know how much is the suit. I saw an article where a professor at a California school says the benefit is purely psychological, but I haven't seen his support for that statement either and have no idea whether he is credible or not. I would never agree that the recent time drops are purely suit related, but I think it is impossible to say that they don't provide a benefit too (either real or imagined). I find it interesting that there really isn't any data that compares tapered swims with and without the suits from Speedo or B70. However, if I were in marketing for Speedo or B70, I wouldn't want there to be any studies published when the trend is their friend. My guess is there isn't data published because it wouldn't fully support the current time drops.
As a late adopter and someone who did their own tapered analysis of the FS Pro and found no benefit, I just want to see a good study that tells me the average time drop related to the latest suits so I can make a better decision. If I didn't see evidence that other advancements in swimming were not occurring at the same time as the introduction of these suits, I wouldn't be so curious to see the suit data.
I don't think buying multiple suits and testing each one to find out what works best makes sense for me anyway. I am sure Speedo and B70 would strongly encourage individual scientific testing and multiple suit purchases.
There must be others who would like the average suit benefit data in tapered situations if nothing else than to compare how much of their own time drops are suit related versus other improvements.
Paul, you don't have to repeat "do or don't, we don't care". I understand your point of view. Great swim in the 100 Fly at Nationals by the way.
Tim
Chris and Jazz,
Good luck convincing the group that the suits are not the single largest contributing factor. I think it is probably a combination of the suits, general stroke improvements, and SDKs, etc. I would just like to know how much is the suit. I saw an article where a professor at a California school says the benefit is purely psychological, but I haven't seen his support for that statement either and have no idea whether he is credible or not. I would never agree that the recent time drops are purely suit related, but I think it is impossible to say that they don't provide a benefit too (either real or imagined). I find it interesting that there really isn't any data that compares tapered swims with and without the suits from Speedo or B70. However, if I were in marketing for Speedo or B70, I wouldn't want there to be any studies published when the trend is their friend. My guess is there isn't data published because it wouldn't fully support the current time drops.
As a late adopter and someone who did their own tapered analysis of the FS Pro and found no benefit, I just want to see a good study that tells me the average time drop related to the latest suits so I can make a better decision. If I didn't see evidence that other advancements in swimming were not occurring at the same time as the introduction of these suits, I wouldn't be so curious to see the suit data.
I don't think buying multiple suits and testing each one to find out what works best makes sense for me anyway. I am sure Speedo and B70 would strongly encourage individual scientific testing and multiple suit purchases.
There must be others who would like the average suit benefit data in tapered situations if nothing else than to compare how much of their own time drops are suit related versus other improvements.
Paul, you don't have to repeat "do or don't, we don't care". I understand your point of view. Great swim in the 100 Fly at Nationals by the way.
Tim
