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NFHS on Suit Rule - No Changes...Yet

Becky Oakes, Assistant Director at the National Federation of State High School Associations, said in an email regarding the suit controversy:

The NFHS Swimming and Diving Rules Committee has not currently made any changes in the swimming rules regarding swimwear at this time. The committee chair and I are monitoring the developments as they unfold with FINA, NCAA and USA-S. We are maintaining direct communication with the NCAA and USA-S as these organizations are addressing the suit issue. The NFHS will keep the state associations informed of the new developments and any changes regarding the NFHS rules. This is a challenging issue for the swimming world in general. The NFHS Swimming and Diving Committee is very concerned of the impact the technical suits have had on swimming.

So, at this point, NFHS has not banned the suits, however, that could change in the near future. Also to note, if USA Swimming goes along with the FINA regulations, I would assume that in order to have a swim "observed" at the High School Championship Meet, regardless of the stance taken by NFHS, the swimmers would be forced to wear suits which comply with the USA Swimming rules. This should certainly be interesting to see how everything plays out over the next few months.

The Continuing Swimsuit Debate

At FINA's World Championship event, the latest in swimsuit technology definitely appears to be helping set numerous world records, but the future for these "supersuits" looks bleak. FINA, swimming's international governing body released the following statement from their recent meeting at the World Championship:

On its first meeting held today in Rome (ITA), the 2009-2013 FINA Bureau fully complied with the decision of the FINA Congress, held on July 24, 2009 related with the procedure concerning swimwear approval. As it was also decided by the Congress, these rules are now By-Laws rules, which allow the Bureau to further control, update and correct any deviation to the process or to proceed with any necessary adjustment related to the development of the swimsuit technology.

The FINA Bureau decisions on swimsuits include:

MATERIAL – The material of the swimsuits will definitively be constituted only by textile fabric(s). The definition of “textile” will be made by a group of scientific experts chosen by FINA and led by Prof. Jan-Anders Manson, from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) in Lausanne (SUI). This definition will be available to manufacturers by no later than September 30, 2009. The first definition of “textile” to be further confirmed by this group is: “Material consisting of, natural and/or synthetic, individual and non consolidated yarns used to constitute a fabric by weaving, knitting, and/or braiding.”

SHAPE – For men, the swimsuit shall not extend above the navel nor below the knee, and for women, shall not cover the neck, extend past the shoulder, nor extend below knee. Furthermore, no zippers or other fastening system is allowed.

USE – In the regulation approved by the Congress, the swimmer can only wear one swimsuit and no taping is allowed.

TESTS – Only measurable scientific tests will be performed within the frame of the swimwear approval procedure. For thickness, the 1mm limit will be adjusted to 0.8mm, for buoyancy the present value of 1 Newton will be reduced to 0.5 (FINA will even consider the limit of 0 Newton), and for permeability the material(s) used must have at any point a value of more than 80l/m2/second. Permeability values are measured on material with a standard multidirectional stretch of 25%. These parameters will be further considered by the above mentioned scientific group.

CONSISTENCY – Swimsuits effectively manufactured and used shall correspond to and be fully consistent with submitted samples. Any modification before use (including impregnation) is prohibited. Moreover, there shall be no variation/modification for individual swimmers.

APPLICATION – Considering the time needed for manufacturers to produce their swimsuits, the submission dates and the implementation of the rules are applicable from 2010 only in Swimming competitions.

From what I have read, the rule change will probably not take effect until around April of next year, so as to give suit manufacturers the time to create suits within compliance of the new rules. As this is a recent rule change, USA Swimming (to my knowledge) has not yet changed their rules to reflect the international changes, but one can only assume that USA Swimming will soon enough follow in FINA's wake, just as they had announced over the past few months that they would agree to the same rules previously set out. I have sent an email to the National Federation of High Schools (governing body for High School Sports) regarding the rule change, and if I receive a response, I will post it here in an update.

USA Swimming Will Follow FINA's suit list

At their meeting at the end of May, the USA Rules and Regulations Committee decided to enact the same Regulations for approved suits as FINA announced just weeks earlier. The official statement released by the Committee can be found here. To my knowledge, this does not yet mean that there are any new regulations for suits within the high school swimming world. When the National Federation of State High School Association's Swimming and Diving Rules Committee met in April, they discussed the high-tech swimsuit issue at great length, however decided not to make a ruling yet regarding the suits. It will be interesting to see if this changes in the near future now that both FINA and USA Swimming have made decisions.
At that same NFHS meeting, a few other rule changes were made for the 2009-2010 season, the most notable being the new backstroke starting protocol. Swimmers are now allowed to place their feet out of the water at the beginning of a backstroke start, provided that the feet, including the toes, are not above or curling over the lip or the gutter of the pool. The article about this can be found here, and a list of rule changes for next season can be found here.
Also, a note about the blog, I am adding to the sidebar on the right a list of links to documents, including for now a list of past team champions (since 1986), the state meet qualifying times (from 2008-2009), and the state meet records. Over the next few weeks, I will be adding more useful documents there, probably in the form of results from past state meets, and anything else that may be interesting. Have a nice summer.

FINA releases 2009 List of Approved Suits

While at this point, USA Swimming, and NFHS have not taken any action regarding this, FINA has determined the suits which will be considered eligible in the year 2009, and missing from that list are any blueseventy suits. According to Swimming World Magazine, the blueseventy company has 30 days to fix the suits to fall in accordance with the FINA regulations. I'm sure that out of season, not many have been watching this blog, but this should prove interesting for next year's swim season, depending on the rulings made here in the USA, also considering FINA's list "expires" on December 31, 2009, in the middle of the high school season.

A Few More Thoughts

Having seen all of the discussion generated over the Swimmer of the Year choice, as well as some of the other comments, I thought I would add something to the discussion. First of all, keep in mind that a similar situation arose a few years ago between Chris Brady (who recently broke one of Mark Spitz's final collegiate records, without the aid of a new technical suit - article) and Grady Carter, with Carter winning the 50 and 100 Freestyle, and Brady taking 2nd in the 50 Free and winning the 100 Fly. Chris Brady came away swimmer of the year that year, due to the closeness of the 50 Free and his power point score in the 100 Fly. Is the system flawed? Probably. Now, many people have offered some suggestions, and I think that one of the best ideas is to somehow incorporate times from the rest of the season, or points scored at dual meets, or some other way to make it truly the Swimmer of the Year, not just of the State Meet. If they want to recognize both, I would see no issue, but basing the year's award on two days of a meet seems unjust at times (and the same goes for the rest of the All-State selections, but they tend to be pretty logical as it is). By all means, continue talking about this, maybe somehow a better idea can evolve from enough different people putting their thoughts together. A few notes though...try to keep comments on topic, and don't sign in as someone who you are not, it makes people sound bad who aren't trying to act the way you portray them. Also, one other comment about one of the more recent posts, regarding Curtis Ramsey's not swimming against Tanner or some others. He did in fact go home sick the day of the Brandywine meet, however, McKee swam the IM and Back, 2 events that Curtis most likely would not have swam. And he asked to go to practice on the day of the DMA meet, although he most likely wouldn't have raced Tanner, because he would have been in the 50 and 100 Free. And over the summer, Curtis swam the 50 and 100 Free, those are his two events, Tanner swam other events (Fly and IM) so Curtis was certainly not shying away from the competition in that respect either.
As for the future of this blog, I have certainly enjoyed writing the posts that I have, and watching it grow from me writing the first post to a home to discuss Delaware Swimming. I will be graduating from Charter in May, and I think no matter where I go to college, I will try to maintain the blog next year, getting what information that I can from the Internet as well as everyone who I will still know in Delaware Swimming. So unless something really interesting comes up, or I see a comment that sparks my attention, this will probably be the last post for the year. For those who still have meets for other teams left this year, good luck, and I hope everyone has a safe end of the school year and summer.

States Wrap-Up

Another year of high school swimming has ended, and the state meet was very fast and very exciting. We saw three records fall, two in the morning, one at night, and countless others close calls with records that may be broken in the next few years. In the days to come, we will learn of the official all-state selections, as well as the swimmers of the year. Nicole Vernon is the obvious choice for the girls, but the boys decision is not as easy. Based purely on the NISCA power points, Tanner Kurz should be the Swimmer of the Year, but he only won one event, while Clifton Gordon won both of his events, including a win over Tanner. Looking at the tables, it seems to me like the breaststroke power points are a little "higher" than some of the other events, and the 500 seems a little lower. Now, it is hard to judge, and is based a lot on perception, but I agree with one of the comments on the last post that it is tough to determine the all-state swimmers based only on two races at the state meet. I think if they were to use the power points as a "guide" but still took into account some sort of vote by the coaches that it would lead to a better choice of swimmers. Also, I still think they should take into account somehow the swimmers in the Consolation Finals. They can score points for the team, so why not for themselves in the all-state race? Even if they were counted at something like 3/4 value, it would still give them an opportunity to earn some more points, and give the advantage on who makes those last few spots on second team to whoever scores the most points in their second event.
On another note, I wanted to throw in a comment regarding the new controversy over the latest "technical" racing suits. The two most advanced suits these days are the LZR Racer by Speedo and the Nero by blueseventy. The LZR has been shown to set many records at the Olympics and throughout other top level competitions, and costs $290 for the jammer, $350 for the legskin, and $550 for the full body at speedousa.com (women's suits range from $425-$550). The blueseventy suits look like they cost something like $395 for the full suit. For those swimmers and teams who can afford to buy these suits, they certainly are given an edge over those who cannot. Blueseventy is a wetsuit company, meaning their suits are going to be more buoyant (one rumor I have heard is that it takes 50 lbs. to submerge one of those suits), giving wearers extra buoyancy and the ability to float on top of the water. There has been talk of disallowing them by FINA, but for the time being they are perfectly legal. From what I have read though, by next year, some tighter restrictions may be in place, and swimmers may lose the advantage of the latest technologies.