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The Clipboard Spring 2009 |
Department of Kinesiology College of Human Sciences Iowa State University |
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ISU Researcher Contributes to the LZR Racer Swimsuit Dr. Rick Sharp, professor of Kinesiology, insisted that it's the swimmer, and not necessarily the suit, that ultimately produced gold medals at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. No one disputes the idea that a better suit helps, however. Jason Rance, chief of Speedo's Aqualab global R&D center in England asked Sharp to join a team of outside experts in 2004 to help Speedo build a better swimsuit. The "better suit" has become Speedo's LZR Racer®. After three years of the most extensive research and development in swimwear history, the LZR RACER made its debut at the 2008 Missouri Grand Prix Swim Meet where it was clearly a stroke above the rest, helping to set three world records and three American records. The world's first fully-bonded bodysuit, the LZR Racer was worn by Michael Phelps for each of his 8 Gold Medal victories in the Beijing Olympic Games. In fact, swimmers wearing the Speedo LZR Racer in Beijing won 94% of the gold medals, 89% of all medals, and set 23 out of the 25 world records that were broken. To develop this record-breaking suit, Speedo began by digitally scanning the bodies of 400 top-level swimmers and consulting medical experts to make sure that the suit was properly designed to help maximize the potential of the human form. Engineering experts then helped develop the LZR PULSE fabric that not only repels water and chlorine but also offers 5% better muscle oxygen efficiency than any other lightweight suit on the market. Meanwhile, Speedo’s own Aqualab worked closely with specialists from NASA to make sure that the LZR RACER was as sleek and hydrodynamic as it could be. But Sharp still contended it wasn’t the suit that would make swimmers truly super in Beijing. "The suit has a lot of outstanding technical qualities, but it doesn't know how to swim," said Sharp, who also is director of ISU's kinesiology laboratories. "It's that interaction between talent and technology that makes it really special, I think”, Sharp said. “It's not going to take someone who's not already an elite, world class swimmer and put them at that level. It can't do that. But it can help that elite athlete optimize that last little bit of performance they need to compete favorably, set a record, win a race -- unless, of course, the person in the next lane is also wearing the suit”, which happened at the Olympics. "I think it's pretty gratifying to work with a company that put so many resources behind development of an effective product and works so closely with athletes and coaches around the world. It's nice that the product then performs as well in competition as it did during all our hours of testing over the last few years," Dr. Sharp said. The LZR Racer's impact has been so profound that it's been profiled by numerous national media outlets. It's even been included in a display of costumes worn by comic book heroes in New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art. This article is a compilation of information from ISU news articles available from ISU News Service and the Speedo LZR Racer website.
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