Month: May 2008

The Japanese Swimming Federation gave the three Japanese sportswear companies until May 30 to come up with an outfit comparable to the LZR Racer, which they then have unveiled by now. Asics and Descente have used a new “world’s fastest swimwear material” called Biorubber Swim-SCS Fabric and polyurethane, while Mizuno say they have a new material tightening the swimmer’s body.

Source: AFP

Irish Andrew Bree admitted the use of an over-the-counter Vicks Nasal Inhaler, which in the US contains the banned substance of Levmethamfetamine. The doping panel was convinced that the use of the drug was not intended to enhance performance and that Bree had gone to “all possible lengths to check that the medial product that he was using contained no such banned substance.”

Source: SwimInfo

Western Australian Institute of Sport (WAIS) and the University of Western Australia can determine whether a change is beneficial without actually changing a swimmer’s technique, by inputting the 3D kinematics (body movements) of the swimmer, and then calculate the way the water moves around this 3D animation using ‘computational fluid dynamics’. This takes the ‘trial and error’ approach out of technique prescription. The video below demonstrates how they can model and measure the swimming stroke of world record holder Eamon Sullivan.

Source: ScienceNetwork WA

In a Grand Prix meet at Santa Clara, Calif., Phelps won the 100 backstroke in 54.03 seconds. World record-holder Aaron Peirsol, the reigning Olympic champion, was second in 54.36. It was the first time Phelps had ever beaten Peirsol in backstroke.

Source: indystar.com

With outsider points like “In the same way that most men believe red sports cars are speedier than those of other hues, they believe Speedos go faster than normal trunks” and “Well, on behalf of readers, a friend of mine examined them to see if there was obvious NASA input. There were no rockets, fuel cells, turbo-chargers or loose O-rings, designed to fall off in mid-flight. Then he noticed the price-tag: US$800. That was the only bit that reminded him of NASA.”

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Premier Management Group (PMG) responds to TYR lawsuit against Eric Vendt, stating that they “will no longer sign our clients with TYR Sport, effective immediately”.

Source: SwimNews

Their current contract prohibits swimmers wearing anything but Mizuna, Asics and Descente (an Arena brand); but now the Japanese considers allowing also Speedo LZR, if not the three contracted companies improve each of their current models to be equally as good as the new Speedo swimwear by May 30.

Source: SwimInfo