Written by: Dan
Empfield
Date: Fri Oct 05 2007
WTC's head of commissaires Jim Riccitello is
uneasy about the new speedskins popping up at his
non-wetsuit-legal Ironman races. While acknowledging they are nowhere near as
fast as wetsuits, he swam in them himself during his own evaluation and says,
"They are buoyant, you can feel the buoyancy when you swim."
Last year's Hawaiian
Ironman winner Normann Stadler
and perennial women's winner Natascha Badmann are both expected to swim in Blue Seventy's speedskin, and last year's women's champ Michellie Jones will probably toe the line in 2XU's
version. Speedskin-wearing Stadler
raised eyebrows last year when he exited the water much closer to German rival Faris Al Sultan. Some professionals in Kona credited Stadler's choice of swimwear with granting him his winning
margin over
This year, expect most
of the pro athletes to wear a speedskin. Why is this
so, when swimming's stars don't enjoy an obvious advantage and often race
without them in the pool? Because triathletes
wear skins that have never been deemed legal to use in a swim meet. While
these suits haven't raised the eyebrow's of those at
USA Triathlon, they make WTC's Riccitello nervous.
Triathlon's test for
legality is to place 61 grams of weight on a suit, wrung free of air, and
placed a foot or two under the water's surface. If the suit sinks it's legal,
otherwise it's not. Riccitello is unconvinced that
this protocol is foolproof. His tests on suits differs,
in some cases, with results from tests on the same suits tested the same way by
USAT.
"If it was up to
me we would accede to FINA's judgment on
swimwear," Riccitellos said. "But USAT
disagrees with me." FINA is the internation
federation for swimmming. He acknowledged that WTC is
trying to defer to USAT's rulebook as much as it can,
asking for a variance from the rules only when WTC feels such a departure is
critical. Typically, such variances have been sought on rules that govern
position violations on the bike course. Almost never does WTC differ from USAT
on equipment, though it put its foot down last year when USAT said it would not
allow helmets certified under
WTC sent a letter
earlier this week to its pro athletes attending the Ironman, saying all speedskins must be approved by FINA or by USAT's head of officials Charlie Crawford. The letter went
on to read, "Ironman reserves the right to perform buoyancy tests on suits
after the swim portion of the race... swim wear not passing the buoyancy test
cannot be appealed."
One manufacturer of speedskins contacted Slowtwitch.com earlier in the week,
shaken by the letter from WTC and worried that its product might cause the
disqualification of star athletes who use the product. But Riccitello
said these companies have nothing to worry about if USAT's
Crawford has okayed the product. Riccitello's
bigger concern is nonconforming speedskins -- cheater
suits -- apparel that appears like that submitted for testing to USAT but made
with different material for use by certain pro swimmers. "I don't have the time, pre-race," to check everyone's
swimwear," said Riccitello. "I won't be
able to tell who's got a suit that differs from that submitted to Charlie. So
we may test some suits after the swim."
Riccitello said that he sought USAT's agreement earlier in the year to limit such suits to
those approved by FINA, and USAT resisted. But Crawford acknowledged more
recently, says Riccitello, that WTC was free to do so
for its races, such acknowledgement coming too late, according to Riccitello, to disallow the suits' use in Kona.
Riccitello's posture suggests this
may be the one and only year these suits are allowable in the Hawaiian Ironman,
though there is no suggestion USAT will adopt FINA's
more stringent standard for non-Ironman races.