From Swimnews

I found Lord's comments distasteful and moronic, especially since he doesn't seem very dialed into masters swimming. He is on a warpath against "rubber" suits and is clearly not very impartial on the subject. Yet it seems to me that -- in the midst of all the insults he hurls at us -- he doesn't really care about masters swimming per se, he is mostly worried that elite swimmers will swim at masters meets as a way to skirt the rules. On the one hand, FINA's apparent decision to exempt masters -- if that's what will happen -- is a little of a relief because I think FINA really is making it up as they go along at this point. The FS-Pro legskins are not on the list, but the full body is? Same thing with the Tyr Tracer Light. These are not impermeable suits. But I really do hope that, once the dust settles on this (post Jan 1, 2010), USMS and USA-S to have the same rules about swimwear, and that they are in line with FINA's guidelines. I was also somewhat amused by the realization that FINA does not accept masters WRs that are swum at USA-S meets...which now follow FINA's more stringent swimwear guidelines, while USMS doesn't. Honestly, my initial thought was that FINA just doesn't want to deal with masters right now, they have enough to worry about with "regular" swimming. Hopefully in the future we'll all be one happy family again.

I found Lord's comments distasteful and moronic, especially since he doesn't seem very dialed into masters swimming. He is on a warpath against "rubber" suits and is clearly not very impartial on the subject. Yet it seems to me that -- in the midst of all the insults he hurls at us -- he doesn't really care about masters swimming per se, he is mostly worried that elite swimmers will swim at masters meets as a way to skirt the rules. On the one hand, FINA's apparent decision to exempt masters -- if that's what will happen -- is a little of a relief because I think FINA really is making it up as they go along at this point. The FS-Pro legskins are not on the list, but the full body is? Same thing with the Tyr Tracer Light. These are not impermeable suits. But I really do hope that, once the dust settles on this (post Jan 1, 2010), USMS and USA-S to have the same rules about swimwear, and that they are in line with FINA's guidelines. I was also somewhat amused by the realization that FINA does not accept masters WRs that are swum at USA-S meets...which now follow FINA's more stringent swimwear guidelines, while USMS doesn't. Honestly, my initial thought was that FINA just doesn't want to deal with masters right now, they have enough to worry about with "regular" swimming. Hopefully in the future we'll all be one happy family again.