Endurance artist David Blaine held his breath for 17 minutes 4 seconds today on the Oprah Winfrey Show, breaking the previous mark of 16 minutes 38 second set by Peter Colat on February 10 this year.
Month: April 2008
Sometimes we forget that swimming is more than just a sport.
See www.infantswim.com to learn more about this particular program.
Swimmers not wearing the new space-age swimsuits should either stop crying about it or move heaven and earth to get their hands on them, says Australian head coach Don Talbot according to the Herald Sun. Meanwhile, Germans smell Olympic disaster because of wearing the wrong suits.
Carlile urges us all, swimming federations and individuals, to make our voices heard, if we believe, as he, that the intrusion of the Speedo LZR and similar Hi Tech swimwears is harming our sport. Below is enclosed the open letter from Forbes Carlile, as shown here on SwimNews.
Amaury Leveaux has broken the european men’s 50 free SCM record today with a time of 21.38, well below the 21.50 former record of Alain Bernard that was the world mark one month again, and just one tenth of a second from the 21.28 that is the current world record of Eamon Sullivan. Read here at SwimInfo.
Two world records fell at the Australian Grand Prix yesterday. Libby Trickett broke the 100 butterfly world record with a time of 55.74, beating Felicia Galvez’s time of 55.89 from two weeks ago. And Leisel Jones lowered her own 100 breaststroke world record from 1:03.86 to 1:03.72. Read here and here at SwimInfo.
Try and tell me that if Matt Biondi or Tom Jager wore these suits they wouldn’t have been much faster. Jager’s 21.81 50 free from 1990 with a two percent decrease is a 21.37. All of a sudden Eamon’s 21.28 isn’t that ridiculous. Biondi’s 21.85 (1990) and 48.42 (1988) turn into 21.41 and a “world record†47.45 respectively.
How about the women? Janet Evans’ 4:03.85 400 free from 1988 turns into a 3:58.97. Mary T’s 2:05.96 200 fly from 1981 turns into a 2:03.44. I could go all day with this, but you get the point.
The truly scary part is that this “two percent†theory applies to the new suits vs. the most recent suits before hand. Compare it to what the older timers above were wearing and you go way past the realm of ridiculous.
Source: SwimNetwork.com
As you can read here on SwimInfo.com, TYR yesterday announced its newest swimsuit called the Tracer Rice at the French Olympic Trials. According to Scott Goldblatt at SwimNetwork.com, one of the novelties of this new suit is that it shifts the center of buoyancy closer to the center of mass, in such a way that the legs now sink less relative to the rest of the body.
Laure Manaudou is having a difficult time at the French Olympic Trials, first finishing only third in the 400 freestyle, and then pulling out of the 200. She holds the world record in both events. Read more about it for instance here on SwimNews and here on iht.com.
Here is the 400 freestyle with Manoudou getting very emotional when questioned by journalists afterwards.