The banned supersuits of 2009

Without the historic swimming events of 2009, I doubt I would have ever created "TheSwimsuitGuy". As an impressionable, young 13-year-old I woke up early to head to my neighbour's house (my parents didn't have Eurosport) to watch the morning prelims of the 2009 FINA World Championships in Rome with the sheer excitement that in literally any heat a new World Record would be set.

The reason for this was that in 2009 the swimming world was introduced to the fastest tech suits of all time, nicknamed the "shiny suits" or "super suits". Today I am going to walk you through the 6 full body suits that led to a complete ban and changed the sport forever.

But before we break down the different models, we first have to understand how 6 completely different manufacturers all stumbled upon a game-changing suit in a mere matter of weeks... after years of rubbish and slow race suits....

Speedo LZR RAcer

Before 2008 tech suits made a lot of big claims, but the bottom line was that they were rubbish. Speedo's FS2 was heavy and slow, TYR relied on gimmicks like the Aqua Band and while I would say I preferred arena's Powerskin, its stitched seams and thick fabric were a far cry to what we have today. The fact of the matter was that a large majority of swimmers avoided the full bodysuits to instead wear a legskin or jammer, or in the women's case, a kneeskin or even a standard costume.

Speedo must have known that the current offerings sucked and they were hard at work in their Aqualab trying to figure out a way to make a truly fast suit. After enlisting the help of NASA, they finally succeeded with the LZR Racer in 2008. It was an ICON. It dominated the Olympics. It was worn by EVERYONE. 94% of the medals in Beijing were won in a LZR Racer. Then there was Michael Phelps, who wore the LZR to win 8 gold medals and make athletic and Olympic history.

While the LZR Racer was good, I had a theory that today's jammers are actually faster than a LZR Racer bodysuit and I recently put that theory for a test in a video on YouTube, go give it a watch.

Back in 2008, the LZR Racer had a complete market monopoly, and it seemed it would dominate every major meet for years to come.

But the reality was far from that. While I do not doubt that Speedo spent both years and millions on developing the LZR, I think the other players took a much easier route.

Purchase a few LZRs, work out what makes them so fast, and expand on that.

Within the year thats what arena, Jaked, TYR, Descente and even Adidas had done. They took elements like the bonded seams (which they had never done before) and copied them and when it came to the polyurethane panels, they went further, not just copying what Speedo had done, but instead one-upping them. Instead of strategic panels, they went all in, completely covering their suits with the plastic!

This didn't lead to Speedo now having close competition in the tech suit market, it led to Speedo having an outdated suit which was now comparatively slow. Just one year after it reinvented the market, it was now a suit that you would be stupid to wear. In all use cases, for every single event, it couldn't even hold a candle to its competitors. To illustrate my point, the LZR led to a crazy 25 World Records being broken at the 2008 Olympic Games. The 2009 suits combined to break 43 World Records at the 2009 World Championships. Almost a 100% increase and still to this day most world records were broken at a swimming competition.

So what were the new suits on the block?

arena x-glide

Featuring in Time Magazine's "50 Best Inventions of 2009" the X-Glide was probably the most prolific suit of 2009. Scrap that, it was probably the most prolific suit of all time.

I will let arena tell you what was going on with it.

Unlike other racing suits, it uses a full polyurethane coating, giving it the advantage of reduced friction. This coating also traps air, increasing the buoyancy of the swimmer and reducing drag. Underneath this coating, there are two layers – one layer of titanium alloy and a layer of high-tech fabric beneath it. The titanium alloy stabilizes body temperature. The innermost layer was engineered by a company known as Kinetech™, and is called the “Hydro Stealth” layer by Arena®. This fabric optimizes muscle compression, which reduces fatigue by preventing the muscles from vibrating. In addition, this fabric facilitates optimal blood circulation and slows the build up of lactic acid in the muscles. Another benefit of the suit is the Hoop Kompressor®, which delivers superior stability to the swimmer’s body during the stroke.

What does that all mean? The suit was a cheat code. It was so buoyant you nearly floated above the water and its compression meant even the most muscley of swimmers were streamlined.

Sadly I have yet to get my hands on one of these but hopefully one day I can find one in good condition to make a video for you.

One further note about this suit is that FINA didn't approve the first iteration of this suit and they tweaked it to only have 90% polyurethane with strips of uncoated fabric down the sides of the suit and on the inner thigh.

There were two colourways of this suit and it was as iconic as the LZR Racer, just a LOT FASTER.

One caveat with the X-Glide, if my memory serves me correctly, was that you couldn't just buy one of these suits. If you were an elite swimmer, arena would have no problem hooking you up, but for mere mortals like 13-year-old me, you could just go online and order one.

Jaked J01

If you couldn't manage to get your hands on an X-Glide because you weren't fast enough, then the suit to get was Jaked's J01. You could buy it online. They were available to the masses and they came in some crazy colourways like a Ferrari red or a garish gold.

I have worn a Jaked and let me tell you it's pure madness. The first time I ever wore one, I went a 3-second 100 freestyle PB in training...

This suit had a 100% polyurethane film and was the second most used suit of 2009, only behind the arena. From what I hear the arena was a thicker suit and I can attest to the Jaked being very fragile. If you had not cut your fingernails before putting it on, there was a good chance you would rip it. There are some iconic pictures of swimmers ripping their Jaked's just as they were about to race.

Looking back it's kind of crazy because 2009 launched both arena and Jaked into the spotlight. While arena stuck around and cemented itself as THE tech suit brand, Jaked has been on a slow decline since then, to a point where most swimmers aren't even sure if Jaked still make race suits.

Because you could readily buy the Jaked, there were also stories of swimmers realising that one Jaked was buoyant, but if you could manage to get two on, you literally would be more out of the water than in it. This was technically illegal.

Adidas Hydrofoil

I would guess that this is the rarest 2009 super suit, rarer even than the X-Glide. I know much less about this suit and only a few athletes (including a few GB swimmers) wore this suit.

I can't even find a picture of this suit without specifically googling the swimmers I knew who wore it like Helge Meeuw, Jo Jackson and Britta Steffen.

One thing I am not 100% sure on is what standards FINA set with these suits as they did have to get approved. I think it was a bit of a case-by-case situation.

Jaked had a suit that was 100% polyurethane.

arena was closer to 90%....

Adidas was probably like 98% because they had these little uncoated panels on the chest (of just the men's suits). I am not sure if that was to appease FINA or if it was a "feature".

You could never buy the Hydrofoil. I am not sure how many were even made. But it was still part of a historic year.

Blue70 Nero

Now this is a suit I do know about. I had 3 of these and it was the people suits. It was readily available, it was half the price of the Jaked/Speedo models and it was FAST.

Instead of using a textile fabric with a polyurethane film, the Blue70 was all neoprene, very much like a wetsuit. I should not have to tell you how buoyant wetsuits are and the same could be said about the Nero. The neoprene construction gave it more longevity than its competitors and the choice of stitched seams instead of bonded was one less point of failure (even if technically slower).

These were not that common at international meets but dominated age group, national and masters meets.

I will always have a love for the Blue70 and think it could hold its own against the best of this era.

Descente aquaforce zero

You know I have an infatuation with Japanese tech suits and before Mizuno's dominance, you had Descente (who now sells suits under arena's branding). There 2009 was another that was completely coated in polyurethane although didn't opt for bonded seams.

The reason this suit made my list is that it was never FINA approved but the Japanese swimming federation had no problem ratifying national records set in this suit. That led to a situation where Ryosuke Irie's national record of 1:52 in the 200 back was faster than the World Record for a period.

TYR Tracer A7

TYR had a rough time in 2009 and not through a lack of trying. In 2008 they had a LZR clone called the Tracer Rise and then in 2009 they added more polyurethane coverage with the Tracer A7 (still looks like only about 75% coverage.

They did actually make a 100% poly suit that FINA never approved but they did send me one to try a few years back and it was CRAZY. You can find out more in this video here.

I Dream of them being brought back

I miss the suits. They made the sport look cool. They brought attention. They brought fast swimming. Not only did the ban stop all of that but it also created some of the slowest years of swimming, diverting eyes from the sport. If you loved watching 2009 because of all the records, 2010 was like watching paint dry. The same for 2011 (with the exception of Lochte).

I don't see World Aquatics bringing them back but maybe start-ups like the Enhance Games may give a platform to show the world what these suits can do once again.