I bought an Orca Predator 2 wetsuit 2 months ago. The guy at the store told me that they run small, and I should get 1 size up from the recommended size for my height and weight. Unfortunately, the store did not have that size, so I tried one on 2 sizes up. The one two sizes up felt fairly tight and the guy said it was a perfect fit, so I bought it. I have since lost about 10 pounds. In my last two races, it felt like I was swimming fast, but my swim splits were much slower (5-10 minutes) than I swim the same distance in the pool. Could my wetsuit be too big, and would this slow me down? Any thoughts would be appreciated.
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Re: wetsuit too big [Jon]
[ In reply to ]
A few thoughts,
Yes, there is a possibility the wetsuit is too big and that's slowing you down, but there are also a couple of other possibilities.
One, you're a sucky open water swimmer. Don't take offense to this, I'm even worse than you could ever be. Nobody swims as far as I do in a swim, first to the right, then to the left, ect...
The second possibility, and I would tend to lean towards this option, you might be swimming againstt you wetsuit. In normal freestyle the object is to push as hard as fast as you can go. With a wetsuit though, you want to slow down your stroke and stretch out more. Wetsuits are ment to glide. Over stroking will actually slow your self down.
And finally, don't worry about pool time-to-open water time. A pool is inherently faster than a lake. Smoother water, lane lines, a line on the bottom so you swim straight, and flip-turns/pushing off the wall speed things up considerably. Don't worry about your pool time, just watch your tri time compared to others.
Yes, there is a possibility the wetsuit is too big and that's slowing you down, but there are also a couple of other possibilities.
One, you're a sucky open water swimmer. Don't take offense to this, I'm even worse than you could ever be. Nobody swims as far as I do in a swim, first to the right, then to the left, ect...
The second possibility, and I would tend to lean towards this option, you might be swimming againstt you wetsuit. In normal freestyle the object is to push as hard as fast as you can go. With a wetsuit though, you want to slow down your stroke and stretch out more. Wetsuits are ment to glide. Over stroking will actually slow your self down.
And finally, don't worry about pool time-to-open water time. A pool is inherently faster than a lake. Smoother water, lane lines, a line on the bottom so you swim straight, and flip-turns/pushing off the wall speed things up considerably. Don't worry about your pool time, just watch your tri time compared to others.
Take your wetsuit to the pool and try swimming a few 100s in it. Over 100m I am typically around 5 seconds faster in my wetsuit so this test might help shed some light on your speed increase/decrease. You should be able to tell if there is a sizing problem by how much water is inside your suit.