The thing to me that stands out is why is the the people who want the suits to stay are the ones that have to defend their position.
I haven't heard a whole lot of good reasons to ban the suits. Just a lot of complaining that that guy or girl is going faster than you think they should be or price. How is a $500 swim suit any different than a $500 driver for golf? Not all parents can buy $500 drivers for their kids, right?
Okay maybe the driver lasts a little longer but still.
A state of the art speed boat or car with the best aerodynamics still can't run without an engine. So even a swimmer in a NASA designed suit still needs something to make him/her go through the water!!
Isn't the argument that the suits make you go faster than you could naturally? Isn't the only real argument in favor of rubberized suits that people like going faster than they can naturally? (All other arguments can be resolved by sticking with purely a textile full-body suit, which I don't love but would prefer to the rubberized suits by far as a compromise.)
You can't play golf without a driver. You can swim without a suit. So there's a difference when talking about technology improvements. Also, golf is a game and swimming is a physical competition. Suits used to be for modesty and the racing was all about the swimmer. Rubberized suits change us from a sport about the purity of a person's physical ability to a sport about who has the best designed swimsuit. It turns us from a sport into a game. Beer league softball, with space-aged aluminum bats, indeed.
The thing to me that stands out is why is the the people who want the suits to stay are the ones that have to defend their position.
I haven't heard a whole lot of good reasons to ban the suits. Just a lot of complaining that that guy or girl is going faster than you think they should be or price. How is a $500 swim suit any different than a $500 driver for golf? Not all parents can buy $500 drivers for their kids, right?
Okay maybe the driver lasts a little longer but still.
A state of the art speed boat or car with the best aerodynamics still can't run without an engine. So even a swimmer in a NASA designed suit still needs something to make him/her go through the water!!
Isn't the argument that the suits make you go faster than you could naturally? Isn't the only real argument in favor of rubberized suits that people like going faster than they can naturally? (All other arguments can be resolved by sticking with purely a textile full-body suit, which I don't love but would prefer to the rubberized suits by far as a compromise.)
You can't play golf without a driver. You can swim without a suit. So there's a difference when talking about technology improvements. Also, golf is a game and swimming is a physical competition. Suits used to be for modesty and the racing was all about the swimmer. Rubberized suits change us from a sport about the purity of a person's physical ability to a sport about who has the best designed swimsuit. It turns us from a sport into a game. Beer league softball, with space-aged aluminum bats, indeed.
