LZR - It's Faster, but by how much ?

roque tells people to get the B70 wet I'm not sure why I prefer DRY I've seen some references to people getting the B70 wet before swimming to improve its stretchiness. Is that advisable? Just wondering, as I know other technical suits are better dry. I am attempting to gather "data," but other factors are mucking up the analysis. Which seems fairly common.

So the rumor is Pellagrini "double bagged" the 400 (B70 outside/LZR inside) which didn't work out so well if its true...it also sounds like FINA is getting an earful about this but is in a bind because they approved the suits saying they are not buoyant so why would two make any difference. Must be run entirely by the french.....

I agree that the tech suits are beneficial. I just can't rationalize the benefit versus comfort issue in the events I care about (400 IM mainly). The benefit might be more for some than others and in some circumstances such as IM given a persons body type it might not make much of a difference at all. I am still shocked that Park did not wear a full tech suit in the 200 free and was second. If the full LZR is worth half a second per 100, then Park would have gone 1:43.8? Holy crap. Maybe Phelps' world record will be challenged if Park just makes some equipment changes. I am wondering if anyone would be up for a masters tech suit semi-scientific comparison next year at SCY Nationals. Break it up into 2 classes of swimmers: 1. Control group - Those that wore speedo briefs or an older generation tech suit without bouyancy benefits, etc. in SCY Nationals last year and will wear the same or similar suit next year. No moving up from briefs to a non-bouyancy tech suit allowed in this group. You have to stay with the same suit that you swam in last year. I guess we could allow people that wore a LZR or B70 last year who are wearing the same in 2009 to be in this group too. I am thinking that there is just some natural improvement here due to technique or training that we will see, but maybe I am wrong. 2. Unlimited class - Those that wore speedo briefs or an older generation tech suit in SCY Nationals last year, but this year they wear LZR, Blue 70, or any similar bouyancy aided suit. Wearing multiple suits is also allowed - the more the better. I guess you don't necessarily have to have swim at SCY Nationals, but you must have comparable meets that you tapered for each year. We pick a few events that draw a decent number of swimmers such as the 50 Free, 100 Free, 100 IM, or others where we would have a good representation. Swimmers would have to have trained seriously and reasonably equally for both nationals with the intent of at least going as fast in 2009 as 2008. You can train anyway you want with the intent on going fast. Everyone can make whatever technique, turn, or other improvements they would like. I am just curious what the numbers would look like and how much the suit improvement varies by person/event/age. If the numbers turn out to be higher than half a second per 100, you might even convince me to give up comfort for a time drop. There were not too many of the latest bouyancy aided suits at SCY nationals last year, but I imagine we will see a lot more in 2009. So, this might be the best opportunity to do such a comparison as long as there are a reasonable number of people that don't upgrade suits and stay in the control group. I volunteer for the control group. Anyone else willing to participate for the sake of quantifying the LZR/B70 benefits at the masters level? Just need what suit you wore in 2008, your 2008 times for the 50 free, 100 free, and 100 IM, or other events and whether you will be in the control group or unlimited group. You can change your mind regarding your group selection anytime between now and SCY Nationals. If the time improvement difference between the groups is more than half a second per 100 on average, I will contribute the cost of a B70 to the bar tab on the last night of Nationals. Any other wagers? Maybe if the difference is less than .4 or .35 seconds per 100, then the unlimited group buys for the control group or vice versa? No sand baggers in the control group! I assume anyone that buys a new LZR or B70 to be in the unlimited group will not be a sand bagger. Anyone in? Tim

I agree that the tech suits are beneficial. I just can't rationalize the benefit versus comfort issue in the events I care about (400 IM mainly). The benefit might be more for some than others and in some circumstances such as IM given a persons body type it might not make much of a difference at all. I am still shocked that Park did not wear a full tech suit in the 200 free and was second. If the full LZR is worth half a second per 100, then Park would have gone 1:43.8? Holy crap. Maybe Phelps' world record will be challenged if Park just makes some equipment changes. I am wondering if anyone would be up for a masters tech suit semi-scientific comparison next year at SCY Nationals. Break it up into 2 classes of swimmers: 1. Control group - Those that wore speedo briefs or an older generation tech suit without bouyancy benefits, etc. in SCY Nationals last year and will wear the same or similar suit next year. No moving up from briefs to a non-bouyancy tech suit allowed in this group. You have to stay with the same suit that you swam in last year. I guess we could allow people that wore a LZR or B70 last year who are wearing the same in 2009 to be in this group too. I am thinking that there is just some natural improvement here due to technique or training that we will see, but maybe I am wrong. 2. Unlimited class - Those that wore speedo briefs or an older generation tech suit in SCY Nationals last year, but this year they wear LZR, Blue 70, or any similar bouyancy aided suit. Wearing multiple suits is also allowed - the more the better. I guess you don't necessarily have to have swim at SCY Nationals, but you must have comparable meets that you tapered for each year. We pick a few events that draw a decent number of swimmers such as the 50 Free, 100 Free, 100 IM, or others where we would have a good representation. Swimmers would have to have trained seriously and reasonably equally for both nationals with the intent of at least going as fast in 2009 as 2008. You can train anyway you want with the intent on going fast. Everyone can make whatever technique, turn, or other improvements they would like. I am just curious what the numbers would look like and how much the suit improvement varies by person/event/age. If the numbers turn out to be higher than half a second per 100, you might even convince me to give up comfort for a time drop. There were not too many of the latest bouyancy aided suits at SCY nationals last year, but I imagine we will see a lot more in 2009. So, this might be the best opportunity to do such a comparison as long as there are a reasonable number of people that don't upgrade suits and stay in the control group. I volunteer for the control group. Anyone else willing to participate for the sake of quantifying the LZR/B70 benefits at the masters level? Just need what suit you wore in 2008, your 2008 times for the 50 free, 100 free, and 100 IM, or other events and whether you will be in the control group or unlimited group. You can change your mind regarding your group selection anytime between now and SCY Nationals. If the time improvement difference between the groups is more than half a second per 100 on average, I will contribute the cost of a B70 to the bar tab on the last night of Nationals. Any other wagers? Maybe if the difference is less than .4 or .35 seconds per 100, then the unlimited group buys for the control group or vice versa? No sand baggers in the control group! I assume anyone that buys a new LZR or B70 to be in the unlimited group will not be a sand bagger. Anyone in? Tim Tim, not sure if you haven't read all the posts on this topic but many of us here (myself, Hoch, Ande, Chris, Fort, etc. etc.) have already conducted that experiment or close enough) and the results are complete...jump on board if you want and see for yourself or ignore what all of us have been saying...no worries either way.

hey ehoch, veddy intresting 2000 FS I 49.15 2004 FS II 49.07 2007 PRO 48.63 2008 LZR 47.83

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. ... And before anybody says this is unique to the 100 Free - just name another event and we can check the times. One of the issues of the "The Nationals Enquirer" had the following table: Event Avg Finalist Time % Improvement from previous M 100 Fr 1996 49.30 n/a 2000 48.95 0.73% 2004 48.80 0.30% 2008 47.77 2.11% M 100 Bk 1996 55.18 n/a 2000 54.85 0.60% 2004 54.52 0.60% 2008 53.28 2.29% W 200 Fr 1996 1:59.95 n/a 2000 1:58.92 0.86% 2004 1:58.69 0.07% 2008 1:56.35 1.97% I haven't checked the math, I assume it is accurate. The last years' improvement, what Erik would call "The LZR effect" (ie, ignoring all other potential factors) is given in bold. The fact of the impossibility of attributing the improvement -- which definitely seems significantly greater than previous years' -- to one specific factor such as the LZR (or another suit) has been beaten to death and I'm not going to talk about it here. But I seem to recall that many -- possibly most -- of the backstrokers wore legskins while all the freestylers (and certainly the women!) wore body suits. Similarly, many/most of the male butterfliers and breastrokers wore legskins, while the male freestylers (and the women) all wore body suits. By any reasonable physical mechanism that I can conceive, I would think the body suits would be more effective than the legskins (which, in turn, would be more effective than LZR jammers). So why did the backstrokers have a similar/larger improvement as the freestylers? I remember Erik confidently predicting that Piersol would lose the backstroke unless he wore a bodysuit...what happened? The butterfly and breastroke events were pretty darn fast, too...I can't believe it took under 52.0 to make the finals of the 100 fly...I haven't done the math, but I wouldn't be surprised if the drop wasn't 2%. Why should it be, if many of the swimmers wore legskins? A theory like "LZRs improve performance by 2%" needs to be correct in both large and small aspects. If the suit is really THAT much better than previous technical suits, then variations in design (bodysuit vs legskins vs jammer) would have a noticeable impact. On the other hand, if there is a 2% improvement across the board, irrespective of the type of suit that was worn, then that strengthens the argument that other factors are important too. Now, the prevalence of legskins in the male non-free events was just my recollection. Maybe I am recalling incorrectly; I know there were some bodysuits too. I don't have the races recorded so I can't review them now.

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, I agree that the numbers raise more questions than they answer. I pay a lot of attention to men's sprinting, and I've seen big drops recently, but I feel like the top times in the individual 50 and 100 free in LCM are only now catching up to insane times from relays and SCY. Way back in 2003, Fred Bousquet anchored the French 4x100 free relay at Worlds. He split 47.03, which is not much slower than his 46.63 at the Olympics this year. But in the individual event in 2003, Bousquet only went 49.30. A couple years later he redefined fast in the 50-yard free with his 18.74, but the same year at Worlds he disappointed again, with a 22.44 in the finals. None of those swims for Bousquet involved a LZR. Now that he, along with everyone else, is going 21-mid, it's easy to say that the suit did it. But I think it's just as likely that there's been a new psychological barrier broken in the men's sprints, and many other events as well.

I am not even sure what there is to argue... Hey, I wore a B70 at nationals because I thought it might help. I am not trying to convince anyone not to wear these suits, but here is what I argue against: -- presenting uncontrolled experiments as definitive proof of the effect...or even that there is one. It just isn't proof. I have very bright colleagues who spend inordinate amounts of time and effort trying to tease out the effects of strongly correlated variables. Then there is the Mark Schubert 2% and the "case closed" people. -- not keeping an open mind and ignoring data that doesn't jibe with what you "know" is true. I apologize for not always holding my tongue about it, but critical thinking is always a good thing and when I don't see it in the forums it bothers me as much as in a classroom. (Besides chemistry I also teach environmental studies classes...so I see a lot of emotional and uncritical thinking!) Look, the bar for "scientific proof" is much higher than your decisions as a consumer. Buy all the suits you want and use them. I have. But there are a lot of superstitions that exist in swimming and I don't like to add to them with unsupported "2%" garbage, or even "it is a huge effect." There have been such claims in the past that have been proven false. The data you cite is suggestive but not at all definitive. People like Jonty Skinner make a living doing scientific study of swimming: stroke counts, stroke rates, metabolism, blood chemistry, etc etc. If we are talking about something that could potentially be so important, why aren't they doing well designed experiments on them? They aren't easy to do but they should be done. And ultimately it should be using swimmers that are tapered and shaved, with and without the suits...looking for effects of body types, stroke mechanics, etc.