Swimming goes high-tech, but is it right?

By Bob Ford | The Philadelphia Inquirer • Published July 03, 2008

PHILADELPHIA — When the magical 1980 Phillies season was about to begin, Mike Schmidt received a $5,000 promotional contract to wear Nike spikes and the promise of a bonus depending on how things went.

Regrettably, the shoes hurt Schmidt’s feet, particularly on the unyielding turf of Veterans Stadium, and Schmitty solved the problem by cutting the logos off a pair of bright red Brooks spikes and sewing homemade Nike logos in their place.

The way Schmidt saw it, Nike got the exposure it paid for, and his tootsies felt better. Win, win.

Brooks didn’t share his view when the subterfuge was discovered, however, leading to some brief, entertaining legal action and, eventually, a comfortable pair of legitimate Nike shoes for Schmidt, who stayed with that company — and actually "wore” the shoes — until he retired.

Sporting-goods manufacturers take this stuff seriously and offer big money to put stars in their products. Just the sales payback from a golfer who goes on a hot streak using a company’s new driver is worth every ugly slice that lands in the water.

Having the same shoe as your hero, using the same bat or hockey stick, there’s big money there. Kids used to have underwear. Now they’ve got to have Under Armour.

The big and sometimes nasty business of product endorsement bubbled to the surface again, quite literally, this week at the U.S. Olympic swimming trials in Omaha, Neb. The swimsuit manufacturers are at war, arguing about whose suits are faster, whose contracted athletes are illegally shimmying into someone else’s racing tights, and which Olympic coaches are playing favorites when they should be operating with patriotic detachment.

Since Speedo introduced the LZR Racer in February, swimmers wearing the super-sleek, extra-buoyant, girdled thingy have set more than three dozen world records. According to Speedo, the suit has special heat-bonded, rather than sewn, seams and the slippery surface was designed with help from NASA engineers. Some of the advantage is probably from the neck up as the Racer has become the "it" suit.