Swimwear Apparel-Textiles- are making big news at the Beijing Olympics. Nine out of ten World Records that have been broken in the first three days of the Olympic Swim Program-have been broken by athletes wearing...... THE NEW HIGH TECH......
Speedo’s LZR Swimsuit (click here for Speedo website with daily Olympic updates)
According to a Press Release earlier this year. Speedo has harnessed the expertise of the United States space agency NASA amongst a number of international research institutes to create a faster suit.(All you sustainability enthusiast's will be excited that the methodology of Biomimicry was used to design this suit--Bio-Mimimicry is simply going with the flow of nature-nature who designs the world of the natural environment to be perfect and purposeful) 
Made from an ultra lightweight, low drag, water repellent, fast drying fabric, unique to Speedo, called LZR PULSE, the LZR RACER is the world’s first fully bonded swimsuit that is ultrasonically welded and gives the effect of no seams at all.
Ultra low drag LZR Panels are embedded into the base fabric to create a ‘Hydro Form Compression system’ helping to compress the entire swimmer’s body into a more streamlined shape and enabling them to cut through the water with more power and agility.
“When I hit the water, I feel like a rocket”, says Michael Phelps, holder of six World records, who has been involved in the development and will be sporting the LZR RACER as he sets out to achieve a world record breaking 8 gold medals in these Olympics. “I can’t wait to race in it………..this is going to take the sport of swimming to a new level”.
His comments, echoed by other elite swimmers, are gratifying for Speedo’s research and development team, Aqualab, who have spent more than three years in intensive research and development to create their most hydro-dynamically advanced swimsuit to date.
Check out this video: Speedo Launches LZR RACER
Speedo scanned the bodies of more than 400 elite swimmers and held technical tests involving more than 100 different fabrics and suit designs in the world’s leading flume and test center.
Team USA travels with a pack of scientists that are evaluating the performance of each swimmer.
Of course the new Aquatic Swim Complex, "The Water Cube" in Beijing is also being touted as a modern performance enhancing marvel and perhaps partially responsible for these world-breaking performances.
Perhaps they should change the name of the "The Water Cube" to the "Fishbowl?"
Now, if we could only get all those NASA scientists to work on improving the sustainability of performance based fabrics..........
Note: In the next 10 days, I will be reporting on advancements in sustainability made in the area of natural-regenerated and synthetic based performance based fibers~Coral
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