The battle of the bodysuits will escalate today should Filippo Magnini, the
Italian world champion who described the controversial Speedo LZR Racer as
“technological doping”, walk out for the final of the 100m freestyle at the
world short-course championships in Manchester in a copycat suit made by
Arena.
The move by Speedo’s rival to deliver a prototype Arena Revolution Mark II –
which was already being dubbed the Arena Revenge last night — for the
sprinter to test in secret yesterday followed the decision of FINA, the
international governing body, after a crisis meeting with all suit makers to
endorse the LZR and allow it to be copied without risk of any challenge for
infringing Speedo patents. Whether Magnini will be allowed to wear his new
suit will be decided by FINA today. Arena said last night that it was
“highly likely” that Magnini would race in a suit that has not been
approved.
Christiano Portas, the head of Arena, said that he had attempted to stand up
for “ethics” at the meeting at Manchester Town Hall but was alone in wishing
to call a halt to a generation of bodysuits that rely less on traditional
“fabric” and more on the kind of high-grade fibre technology that can been
seen in the Speedo garment that NASA, the space agency, helped to design.
The prototype Arena answer, which the Sunday Times was allowed to see last
night, comes complete with panels that look plastic and will help swimmers
skim through the water.
Since the LZR left its London launch pad in mid-February after millions of
dollars was spent on research and development, 33 world records — 19
long-course and 14 short-course — have fallen, all but three of them to
swimmers wearing a suit that has attracted myriad definitions, from “doping
on a hanger” to the “Speedo surfboard”. At the same time of year in the
lead-up to all Olympic Games between 1988 and 2004, the average number of
world long-course records broken is five. Last night at the MEN Arena, three
more world records took the tally to 12 in four days.
Kirsty Coventry, the Texas-based Zimbabwean, eclipsed the oldest world
short-course record, the 200m medley. Her time of 2min 06.16sec bettered the
2:07.89 mark set by Alison Wagner in 1994. The bronze went to Britain’s
Hannah Miley in a Commonwealth record of 2:08.79.
After Ryan Lochte, of the US, had clobbered the 100m medley world record with
a 51.25sec blast, the Dutch quartet of Hinkelien Schreuder, Femke Heemskerk,
Inge Dekker and Marleen Veldhuis destroyed their own world record in the
4x100m freestyle final in 3:29.42. Veldhuis’s 51.43sec homecoming split was
the fastest in history. Fran Halsall celebrated her 18th birthday by leading
off the Britain team in a national record of 52.36sec, providing the
momentum that swept Caitlin McClatchy, Julia Beckett and Melanie Marshall to
bronze in a British record of 3:32.88, a stroke behind Australia. Britain
also celebrated silver, for Liam Tancock, in the 50m backstroke.
Before the relay, Halsall had raced into lane four of the final of the 50m
freestyle today with a British record of 24.2sec. There were also new
national marks for Ellen Gandy and Jemma Lowe in the first and second
semi-finals of the 100m butterfly, on 58.39 and 56.99 respectively. Britain
is having a blast at the first global swimming gathering to be held in this
country since the 1948 Olympic Games in London. The team now boasts a record
19 medals (3 gold, 9 silver and 7 bronze) with one day remaining. Just about
every stroke of that success has unfolded in the LZR Racer.
The record number of records — world, continental and national — witnessed
since February 16 is the tip of an iceberg of evidence that the suit has
transformed the sport in a way not seen since wool suits were sunk by silk
in the 1920s. A snapshot of the Britain team at the MEN Arena reveals that
all but two of 31 national, seven Commonwealth and seven European standards
were set in the LZR, while the margin of personal improvement in hundreds of
performances by swimmers wearing the costume clusters around the 2% mark —
precisely in line with the claims of scientists working for Speedo.
Rival suit makers had cried foul. Yesterday FINA asked them to form a
committee to draw up new rules and quantitative measures as well as
proposals for improving the process by which suits are approved. Portas
said: “FINA apologised because the rules were not very well-worded. The
rules were written in a wishy-washy way.” Shrugging, he added: “A new era in
the sport kicks off today. We can fight for ethics but we stood alone when
it came to everyone saying that the word ‘fabric’ in the rules was just a
generic term. Now we explore many other things.”
The decision will meet with disapproval among purists who feel that the
performances of swimmers have been tainted by the extent to which suits can
now enhance their efforts. Magnini, contracted to Arena, was among those who
had complained that they were racing at a disadvantage to rivals in the LZR.
However, Mark Schubert, head coach at the helm of the USA and its superfish
Michael Phelps (who says he feels he’s travelling in a rocket when he wears
his LZR), retorted: “My advice to athletes is ‘you have a black and white
decision — the money (earned from contracts with companies other than
Speedo) or the gold medal’. And it’s going to be a real test of character as
to what choice they make. There is one manufacturer that’s put millions into
research while the other manufacturers are more into fashion. The other
manufacturers need to put the effort in, catch up and quit whining.”
Arena intends to do just that, while adidas, Mizuno, Nike, and Diana will,
doubtless, also soon have a response to the Speedo suit and the TYR
TracerLight that contains neoprene, a flotation aid.
Australian coach Forbes Carlile, who describes FINA’s position as “negligence
and dereliction of duty” and has been campaigning for bodysuits to be
banned, said that “the game was up, it’s chaos, disruption and false
records, the sport has lost its way.”
An expert in biomimetics, the science of applying designs from nature to solve
problems in engineering, materials science, medicine and other fields, said
that he believed suit makers needed to understand the technology better than
they do: “This suit is affecting tissue response, it is affecting sensory
perception, it could even be changing the signals sent to the brain when the
athlete is under stress and be responsible therefore for altering chemical
response. This is the dawn of a new era and swimming needs to understand
what has arrived in their world and what comes next.” Then there is the cost
— about £350 for the LZR, with a shelf life of between six and twelve wears.
Carlile asks: “How many parents can afford that sort of money for suits
every year?
“We’re creating a haves and have-nots sport where we’ll lose some of our best
kids but we aren’t a philosophical society, we want bums on seats and
internationally sustained publicity.”
To the relief of organisers and FINA, the stands filled yesterday after three
days of poor crowd figures, but there was no surprise to see a broad smile
on the face of the head of the organising committee in Manchester: Stephen
Rubin is also chairman of Pentland, parent company of Speedo.
