What made the LZR Racer so fast and, more importantly, so polarizing?
The sport of swimming saw 25 world records and 65 Olympic records toppled at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China (1). In the subsequent three Summer Games, athletes struggled to reach the mantle set by 2008 Olympians; swimmers at those three Games set twenty one new records in the pool (2). The latest edition in Paris produced a mere four record times (1). What gives for such a phenomenon? The world’s best athletes are certainly not losing their fitness or hindering their performance, especially in today’s technology-driven age of sports science. The answer, in fact, lies in the swimsuit. Speedo’s groundbreaking “LZR Racer”— pronounced as “laser”— is the common denominator of many of 2008’s record-shattering swims. As the Australian-British swimwear distributor claims, 92% of 2008’s medalists wore Speedo’s seminal full-body-swimsuit (3). Criticized as “technological doping,” the LZR Racer utilized engineering principles and innovation to maximize and enhance athletic ability.
Michael Phelps poses in the LZR Racer.
Despite being notoriously difficult to put the LZR on (it takes about 20 minutes to squirm into one), the technology of the suit offers a competitive advantage over those not fitted with it (4). It starts with the material. The LZR Racer utilizes a high-compression fabric of fine nylon and spandex microfibers woven together in high densities to create a lightweight and water-resistant product. Other technological choices made in the material include ultrasonically welded seams, which use high-frequency vibration to melt and fuse thermoplastic materials, helping reduce drag in the water by up to 6 percent compared to traditionally sewn seams (5, 6).
In tandem with these prior innovations, what made Speedo’s LZR technology so unprecedented was the addition of multiple layers of rigid plastic polyurethane panels to stabilize and compress areas of the body that engineers had identified as high-drag-producing. Engineers specifically focused on constricting parts of the torso around the abdomen and lower back (3). The two forms of drag reduced are form drag, resulting from the swimmer’s posture, and skin friction drag, produced by interactions between the swimmer’s body and the water (7). The suit’s compression also allows for better oxygen flow and reduced muscle vibration, lessening fatigue for swimmers (3). Speedo’s choices in the LZR Racer’s construction resulted in a tube-like structure capable of optimizing hydrodynamic performance and enhancing athletes’ biological functions.
The Fastskin LZR Racer X in action.
Speedo did not come to their technological discoveries alone. To create their technological masterpiece, the company enlisted the support of kinesthesiologists, fluid dynamics engineers, textile manufacturers, biomechanics experts, and even aerospace engineers at NASA (3, 7). Elements of their design process included lengthy brainstorming sessions that relied more on superhero costumes than prior swimsuit designs, all in the name of out-of-the-box thinking (8). Their work paid off. Thanks to the LZR Racer, Speedo dominated the swimsuit market during and after the 2008 Olympics.
The two-year, record-breaking span dominated by the LZR and its successors ended in 2010, when the Fédération Internationale de Natation (FINA), now known as World Aquatics, banned their use in competition (9). The argument against the use of such suits included concerns about equal access and questions on whether they diminished the recognition of past swimmers’ athletic abilities. Ultimately, records set in the LZR and affiliated suits were allowed to stand; many have yet to be broken (3).
Evaluating the legacy of the LZR Racer is complicated. While it represented the heights of technology and the perks of the engineering design process, the suit also garnered fair criticism for abetting an unbalanced playing field. Fans of swimming will only have positive memories of the LZR era though, with capstone moments such as Jason Lezak chasing down Alain Bernard and Michael Phelps winning an extraordinary eight gold medals in Beijing.
Bibliography
- Akabas, L. (2024, August 5). 2024 Olympics Swimming Produces 21 Olympic Records Despite Slow Pool. Sportico.com. Retrieved from https://www.sportico.com/leagues/olympics/2024/2024-olympics-swimming-world-record-slow-pool-1234792264/
- Venegas, N. (2024, July 31). Is Olympics Swimming Pool Too Shallow for World Records? Newsweek. Retrieved from https://www.newsweek.com/olympics-swimming-pool-too-shallow-world-records-1932665
- Maher, M. (2019, September 9). The Impact of Invention on Sport. Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation. Retrieved from https://invention.si.edu/impact-invention-sport
- Thurow, R. (2008, August 15). Fast Times. WSJ; The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB121865005500237497
- Perez, D. (2020, December 2). The Technology Behind Speedo’s High-Tech Swimsuits That Challenged the Olympics – Engineering.com. Engineering.com. Retrieved from https://www.engineering.com/the-technology-behind-speedos-high-tech-swimsuits-that-challenged-the-olympics/
- Quintino, L. (2013). Introduction to joining methods in medical applications. Elsevier EBooks, 28–46. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1533/9780857096425.1.28
- Johnson, J. (2022, October 24). How to Engineer a Record-Breaking Swimsuit – USC Viterbi School of Engineering. Usc.edu. Retrieved from https://illumin.usc.edu/how-to-engineer-a-record-breaking-swimsuit/
- Morrison, J. (2012, July 27). How Speedo Created a Record-Breaking Swimsuit. Scientific American. Retrieved from https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-speedo-created-swimsuit/
- Chasan, A. (2024, July 29). Why some types of swimsuits are banned at the Olympics. Cbsnews.com; CBS News. Retrieved from https://www.cbsnews.com/news/olympics-why-some-types-of-swimsuits-are-banned/
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