First of all, you might be asking, what are these high-tech swimsuits? In summary from Wikipedia.com, "These swimsuits are made with scientifically advanced materials with features to reduce drag against the water.The fabrics include features that increase the swimmer's glide through the water (said to mimic marine animal skin) and reduce the absorption of water by the suit as opposed to regular swimsuits." The suits are extremely tight and as I said in my last post, take on average 10-15 minutes to get on.
The mental aspect is something else to think about. When your in this type of suit most people truly believe they are going to swim faster, so they do. I have personal experience with this. Now whether it was the suit or just my mentality, it worked.
So in the competitive world of swimming, when record breaking was such a common happening (about 2008-2010), something needed to change. In 2010, the "swimming governing body" (yes, there actually is one!) banned suits below the knees of swimmers and past the shoulders for women and nothing above the waist or below the knees for men. This made a difference, but still swimming seemed to be more about the technology rather than the swimming.
Now, I am not sure of the specifics but all high-tech suits must be approved by FINA (International Swimming Federation is what it is translated to). This is supposed to decrease the "unfair advantage" of technologically advanced suits. Will as many records be broken? I do know, that now when records are broken it is a big deal as it should be. This is just something that time will have to tell.
In case of any curious readers here is a picture of today's fastest suit (Speedo LZR Elite)
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