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| Hobby Forum Index » Sport - Swimming » "New Suits' Advantages Not Obvious"... |
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| Philip Homburg... |
 Posted: Tue Jul 21, 2009 10:13 am |
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In article <4a648d04$1_1 at (no spam) mk-nntp-2.news.uk.tiscali.com>,
Duncan Heenan <duncanheenan at (no spam) tiscali.co.uk> wrote:
Quote: "Philip Homburg" <philip at (no spam) ue.aioy.eu> wrote in message
news:bkq5cbumsi6k5rm14sen02apm0 at (no spam) inews_id.stereo.hq.phicoh.net...
I think it's fun if a piece of clothing makes you faster.
No. What it does is makes a lot of 'wannabe' kids exert pester power on
their parents to buy them the same stuff as the olympians are wearing,
regardless o fwhy they are swimming, and the fact that most of them will
never win anything anyway. So it just makes the whole sport become more
expensive than it needs ot be, just to make a few manufacturers rich.
I don't know where you live, but there's a lot more people swimming than just
kids.
It's much more likely that the parents want the kids to win, then the other
way around.
With the same line of reasoning, the UCI should ban carbon fiber frames
because kids may want them as well.
--
That was it. Done. The faulty Monk was turned out into the desert where it
could believe what it liked, including the idea that it had been hard done
by. It was allowed to keep its horse, since horses were so cheap to make.
-- Douglas Adams in Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency |
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| Duncan Heenan... |
| Posted: Tue Jul 21, 2009 10:43 pm |
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"Philip Homburg" <philip at (no spam) ue.aioy.eu> wrote in message
news:k5d1mls1fbs7h8ddkntlcull75 at (no spam) inews_id.stereo.hq.phicoh.net...
Quote: In article <4a648d04$1_1 at (no spam) mk-nntp-2.news.uk.tiscali.com>,
Duncan Heenan <duncanheenan at (no spam) tiscali.co.uk> wrote:
"Philip Homburg" <philip at (no spam) ue.aioy.eu> wrote in message
news:bkq5cbumsi6k5rm14sen02apm0 at (no spam) inews_id.stereo.hq.phicoh.net...
I think it's fun if a piece of clothing makes you faster.
No. What it does is makes a lot of 'wannabe' kids exert pester power on
their parents to buy them the same stuff as the olympians are wearing,
regardless o fwhy they are swimming, and the fact that most of them will
never win anything anyway. So it just makes the whole sport become more
expensive than it needs ot be, just to make a few manufacturers rich.
I don't know where you live, but there's a lot more people swimming than
just
kids.
It's much more likely that the parents want the kids to win, then the
other
way around.
With the same line of reasoning, the UCI should ban carbon fiber frames
because kids may want them as well.
Yes |
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| Robert W. McAdams... |
| Posted: Wed Jul 22, 2009 8:10 am |
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Philip Homburg wrote:
Quote: I think it's fun if a piece of clothing makes you faster.
Would you think it was "fun" if professional baseball players started
using a very expensive kind of bat that wore out after a few games, but
that made it easier to hit home runs? (There really are bats, btw, that
would make it easier to hit home runs, and they're fairly durable and
inexpensive. They're just not legal.) Would it be fun to see existing
home run records broken if you knew that the only reason they were being
broken was because of the new bats? What would that prove?
And would it be "fun" to know that baseball players couldn't really
break the old home run records, even if they had the capability to do
so, because there would always be the asterisk in people's minds "But
this 'record' was set using a different kind of bat." This very issue
was raised when Michael Phelps set all of his records at the latest
Olympics. Mark Spitz made the following comment about it:
"I said this sort of tongue-in-cheek that if that suit had hair on it,
Michael would set world records in it and everyone else would get in the
same type of suit. When I broke my first world record, and for the first
four of my life, I wore two swimming suits. So I don't really think it's
the swimming suit."
But even Spitz can only say "I don't really think . . ." He can't know
for certain how much of a role the new suits played in Michael's
performance.
His point about hair suits, though, is well taken. Why are so many boys
nowadays spending $6-$9 more to wear jammers instead of briefs? It's
because that's what they see the Olympic swimmers wearing. The
difference is that the Olympic swimmers are wearing jammers made from
high-tech fabrics that are designed to be "slipperier than your own
skin." But the kids are wearing suits made from low-tech fabrics, so
that wearing jammers instead of briefs is actually making them a little
slower (though the difference isn't likely to be important in races that
are being won or lost by seconds rather than hundredths of seconds).
There was, at one time, a quest for faster suits that consisted of an
effort to minimize the degree to which the suit slowed down the swimmer,
thereby making the swimmer's performance a truer demonstration of his or
her capabilities. In my opinion, as soon as suit design reached the
point where more suit was better, a line was crossed, and the suits
began to be performance enhancers rather than costumes.
Bob |
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| Philip Homburg... |
| Posted: Wed Jul 22, 2009 9:01 am |
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In article <4A671DBA.7070106 at (no spam) fambright.com>,
Robert W. McAdams <rwm at (no spam) fambright.com> wrote:
Quote: Philip Homburg wrote:
I think it's fun if a piece of clothing makes you faster.
Would you think it was "fun" if professional baseball players started
using a very expensive kind of bat that wore out after a few games, but
that made it easier to hit home runs? (There really are bats, btw, that
would make it easier to hit home runs, and they're fairly durable and
inexpensive. They're just not legal.) Would it be fun to see existing
home run records broken if you knew that the only reason they were being
broken was because of the new bats? What would that prove?
It would prove that keeping silly statistics is just that. The goal of the
game is to win, not to beat a random statistic. Yeah, we should really do
something about tennis rackets. People are getting higher speeds on service
and more aces all the time. That's simply not fair to older players.
Quote: There was, at one time, a quest for faster suits that consisted of an
effort to minimize the degree to which the suit slowed down the swimmer,
thereby making the swimmer's performance a truer demonstration of his or
her capabilities. In my opinion, as soon as suit design reached the
point where more suit was better, a line was crossed, and the suits
began to be performance enhancers rather than costumes.
So what about swimming pools? Suddenly it is not unfair if records are broken
in (olympic) swimming pools that are designed to be faster than traditional
pools?
I'd say that shoes with spikes on a track are also performance enhancers.
Let's ban them.
--
That was it. Done. The faulty Monk was turned out into the desert where it
could believe what it liked, including the idea that it had been hard done
by. It was allowed to keep its horse, since horses were so cheap to make.
-- Douglas Adams in Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency |
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| Pat... |
| Posted: Wed Jul 22, 2009 9:55 am |
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Philip Homburg wrote:
Quote:
I'd say that shoes with spikes on a track are also performance
enhancers. Let's ban them.
I was in a doctor's office today, perusing the magazines on golf. Let's get
rid of those silly dimples in the golf balls! After all, the original balls
didn't have dimples. And the club shafts weren't engineered; they were just
wood. And original baseball gloves look very different from today's
baseball gloves. And carbon fiber for bicycles? Bah---it's not fair to Eddy
Merckx.
Like it or not, progress happens.
Pat in TX |
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| MW Smith... |
| Posted: Wed Jul 22, 2009 7:36 pm |
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On Jul 22, 4:10 pm, "Robert W. McAdams" <r... at (no spam) fambright.com> wrote:
Quote: Philip Homburg wrote:
I think it's fun if a piece of clothing makes you faster.
Would you think it was "fun" if professional baseball players started
using a very expensive kind of bat that wore out after a few games, but
that made it easier to hit home runs?
They've been doing that in slowpitch for 25 years. A typical high end
aluminum bat goes for $250. And they do wear out, losing their
springiness.
Quote: (There really are bats, btw, that
would make it easier to hit home runs, and they're fairly durable and
inexpensive. They're just not legal.) Would it be fun to see existing
home run records broken if you knew that the only reason they were being
broken was because of the new bats? What would that prove?
But it wouldn't be the *only* reason the records are broken. You have
to spend a lot of time learning how to swing the bat; you have to have
good eye-hand coordination. You have to have strong shoulders, back
and legs. Actually, being tall and having abnormally long arms is far
more important than the bat. And it doesn't matter how good your bat
is if you can't hit a 100 mph fastball.
Quote: And would it be "fun" to know that baseball players couldn't really
break the old home run records, even if they had the capability to do
so, because there would always be the asterisk in people's minds "But
this 'record' was set using a different kind of bat." This very issue
was raised when Michael Phelps set all of his records at the latest
Olympics. Mark Spitz made the following comment about it:
"I said this sort of tongue-in-cheek that if that suit had hair on it,
Michael would set world records in it and everyone else would get in the
same type of suit. When I broke my first world record, and for the first
four of my life, I wore two swimming suits. So I don't really think it's
the swimming suit."
But he did set the records in a special suit. In fact, swimmers have
been using the special "banana hammock" for decades. And women have
been using speedo-type, skin tight suits for decades as well. And we
have been using goggles since the early 60's. We didn't used to use
goggles, and we used to wear full length woolen swim "costumes". The
switch to skimpy, skin-tight suits enabled new records. I suppose even
using goggles enabled some swimmers to achieve records who wouldn't
have been able to before. So if you are serious about maintaining the
purity of the sport, then let's go back to the suits they wore in the
first Olympics, and let's ban goggles. As it is now, every world
record is tainted by the use of a "banana hammock."
But you aren't really serious about maintaining the purity of the
sport. |
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