Can Michael Phelps beat technical-suit clad swimmers in a jammer? (Wolfgang Rattay, Reuters)
U.S. stars Michael Phelps, Katie Hoff and Ariana Kukors have decided to throw out their long, technical swimsuits before the items are officially banned in January.
All three plan to don short, textile suits in meets this fall and winter. Their decision likely will cause many to stand and applaud.
But will they do anything other than make a statement? Are they doomed to lose?
Phelps declared a couple weeks ago he would wear a waist-to-knee “jammer” beginning with mid-November World Cups in Stockholm and Berlin. At both, he is expected to face Germany’s Paul Biedermann who, in Phelps’s words, “crushed him” in the 200-meter free this summer, with Biedermann suited up in his high-tech Arena X-Glide.
Hoff said Wednesday she and Kukors would follow Phelps’s lead. The two training mates jointly decided to wear short suits in December’s 2009 Mutual of Omaha Duel in the Pool against Germany, Italy and Great Britain, a meet in which Italy will be outfitted in ’09 model Jakeds and all ’09 suits will be allowed.
Hoff said she hoped other Americans would “take a stand” and join the mini-crusade against the suits. American Ryan Lochte said he would consider wearing briefs at the Duel in the Pool if urged on by Phelps.
U.S. Duel team member Jack Brown, meantime, has been through this before. Arizona’s Brown led a jaw-dropping 400-meter individual medley final in August at the U.S. Open in Federal Way, Wash. All eight in the field wore briefs, a decision that earned them a wild standing ovation, but also caused them to swim more slowly and feel more pain. (Their times were significantly slower than in the prelims.)
“I’m hoping it will happen,” Hoff said. “I hope enough people agree.”
Hoff and Phelps both had the same thing to say about their projected performances: If they lose, they lose.
Which brings us to our question of the week: Will they lose, and does it matter?
Does even Phelps, the sport’s resident living legend, have a prayer of winning a single race if his rivals wear rubber suits? Is making a statement better than going full-bore for a victory?
Will the site of the events, 25-meter pools, help or hurt their chances? Phelps hasn’t swum in a short-course meters event since before the suit revolution in 2006; Hoff’s last meet took place in 2004.
Well, what do you think? We want to know. Tell us below.
Tags: Michael Phelps, Ryan Lochte
what better way to promote their sponsors’ new suits? Wanna bet they have a couple dozen of the suit of their choice on hand to use at this meet, while the athletes headed to SC nats and Jr’s and elsewhere in the world are scrambling yet again? It will be just like the good old days again for the USA.
Kudos to Michael, Katie and Arianna – they are the public faces of US Swimming. Everyone has realized the new suits are a joke so demonstrate that it’s not just about winning (although some may be surprised) but it is about standing on your own two feet and doing what’s right.
sc meters will probably help phelps because his turns are the best part of his race
As much as I try to be impressed with Michael Phelps, I always find that impossible. More than any other swimmer, he is responsible for the suit wars. He had no problem wearing a LZR at the Olympics when that suit was the ultimate in technology. He became a proponent of going back to jammers only after he started to lose to swimmers wearing even more advanced suits than the LZR.
Perhaps if Michael and the rest of the U.S. Olympic Team had made a stand when it counted, the swimming world would have been spared the suit wars and all the damages they caused to the sport. I find his sudden conversion to sportsmanship too little too late.
Phelps wants everyone to wear jammers like him. A lot of these other swimmers don’t have a lot of income coming from the sponsor like Phelp’s $million contracts. Its easy Phelps to say, swim in jammers. He benefitted with $$millions from Speedo and Speedo will pay him $$millions to swim in jammers at the Worlds. I’m supporting Bidermann, never like a whinner like Phelps and Bowman. My bet, Bidermann will bet Phelps in any suit at SC Worlds in the 200Free. It’ll be good for Phelps to get his butt kicked and bring his arrogant personality down to the rest of the World.
If a big number of the ‘stars’ of this meet declare to wear traditional textile suits then the shiny suit brigade will be shamed into following ‘suit’ and the sport wil get back to real competition.
To answer the headline question: of course they stand a chance. But this meet is one step up from Shaq Vs. Phelps, it’s a made for tv special, which equates to a money spinner.
While I have been against tech suits since their introduction, I can’t see why they don’t abide by the FINA deadline, which is less than two weeks later.
They will probably loose – given swimmers with comparable speed, tech suits give too much of an advantage.
As for those of you who say there wasn’t “real competition” with the tech suits – you’re wrong. There was never a big meet where the finals featured swimmers who didn’t have similar technology…it was never Phelps in a LZR vs. some guy in a nylon brief. Everyone’s been competing by the same rules. The rules of the day let suit technology become part of the competition just as other sports have done throughout the ages. What suit you wore became part of your preparation just like how you train and what your diet is.
The only unfair competition was the assault on the record book in tech suits.
More than to make a statement by wearing the jammers in this upcomming meet, they should use the more technologized suits. I mean, they should “enjoy” the momment while it lasts. Probably no one wont get a chance to use those suits on another meet. I know that they have a contract with Speedo and everything, but wouldnt it be nice if Phelps faced Biedermann in the 200 freestyle, each of them wearing the same suit. The better swimmer will be decided with no excuces or asterisks on who won the event.
I had a lot of respect for Phelps and Bowman. However, after “crying like babies” in Rome and having received Millions of dollar because wearing the LZR they final said it was bad for the sport when the Jakes and Arena suits make the LZR look really bad. Don’t like cry babies, especially ones that pocket the money then cry foul. I for anyone to beat Phelps. He is not the greatest with that atitude. When pressure is on, you really see what one is made of. Phelps and Bowman failed. Go for the hi tech suits one more time and have fun. Screw Phelps.
I don’t own a tech suit – I typically buy whatever fits and is on sale. I have no illusions of ever winning a swim competition. I do love to swim and to watch swimming competitions, but I don’t know that I have a hard and fast opinion of the use/non-use of tech suits. I do wonder though, if we follow the new anti-tech-suit logic that is being bantered about, then shouldn’t all cyclists’ bike frames and wheels be made from the same materials? Shouldn’t all basketball players wear the same shoes? Shouldn’t all golfers use the same clubs? I think there’s much more involved in leveling the playing field than what swimsuit an athlete chooses to wear.
I think one of the main issue/controversy surrounding the tech suits isn’t so much that they enhance performance and times, but that they do so differently for different people, thus resulting in a less even or level playing field.
For example, these full poly suits are said to have less of an enhancing effect on someone who’s well-conditioned from training hard and already swimming with good technique, as their extra buoyancy and compression may actually provide greater benefits to those swimmers who are less fit and therefore typically really feeling it in the last lap or so, and who perhaps tend to be sloppier in their core work – with these suits, these swimmers won’t have to expend as much effort to stay afloat or focus as much on keeping their head down and their body in a proper line.
Genetics and being in shape can also be a relevant factor here, since the compression and reduced drag provided by these tech suits may well be more beneficial tp someone with a less streamlined body type & shape – it’ll be interesting to see how those bulking elite sprinters with the physique of bodybuilders will do timewise in their textile jammers when 2010 rolls around…
Alistair is correct – there is strong evidence that the suits give an unfair advantage to the weaker swimmer. This has been known for years in triathlon and open water races where wet suits are allowed. It is not like cycling, where the bike is an integral part of the sport. Moreover, Tracy B. is not entirely correct. Cycling does have rules about the type of bicycle that can be used. For example, in professional cycling there is a minimum bicycle weight, the shape of the bicycle must conform to certain standards, and time-trial bikes can only be used in time trials, just to name a few regulations. As far as basketball goes, I doubt that the shoes have a large impact on the performance of the players, certainly not as large as the impact that the high tech suits have in swimming.
As for the Phelps-haters that opined above, I think it is ridiculous to call the most successful swimmer in history a “whinner [sic]” or a cry baby. I doubt that if he really were a whiner he would have one 8 Olympic gold medals in Beijing. I smell jealousy.
It’s not about making a statement, it’s about preparing for where the sport is headed. Phelps swims for the Olympics.