Who is the cervelo of goggles?
Has anyone measured the time saved via various goggles in a water tunnel?
=)
The difference is negligable unless you are wearing the big honkers that cover half your head. You know…the kind that scuba divers wear. And even then…it probably doesnt matter. (If you are wearing those…there’s a good chance you aren’t a good swimmer anyway.)
I swam in school and still wear my TYR socket rockets. They stay on, good visibility, small profile. They are not soft and foamy like some…but they are not as bad as swedes.
Faris wears some pretty big masked goggles and he exits the swim with the lead pack.
Just based on watching the Olympic swimmers the swedes or socket rockets are probably the fastest.
Although Torres used some pretty big ones.
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Who is the cervelo of goggles?
I’m not sure what the Cervelo of goggles is but its probably something like a TYR - a quality nitch player but just rare enough to be cool.
I wear the Trek of goggles - the Speedo Vanquisher. It’s as fast as any of the nitch players and its available everywhere.
The proverbial swedes with their hard plastic, no padding and put them together yourself ethos are the old school steel frame 10 speed.
Seal Masks are the bike with training wheels of goggles.
The difference is negligable unless you are wearing the big honkers that cover half your head. You know…the kind that scuba divers wear. And even then…it probably doesnt matter. (If you are wearing those…there’s a good chance you aren’t a good swimmer anyway.)
I swam in school and still wear my TYR socket rockets. They stay on, good visibility, small profile. They are not soft and foamy like some…but they are not as bad as swedes.
I believe you’re right about this, but it’s interesting how worked up we get about bike parts that make an even more negligable difference! I wish we had water tunnels and could work on being optimal in the water. I’ve gotten a lot faster since I shaved my armpits!
I really like my Sable 101’s. Great clarity and low profile enough for racing.
But, when I really want to do speed work the Speedo Speed Sockets get used.
I never can figure out how people can wear those big bulky goggles while swimming.
I wish we had water tunnels and could work on being optimal in the water.
They do. They are called flumes. There’s one at the olympic training center in Colorado Springs. Its like a big Endless Pool that can crank up to world record pace. They have various tools available like high speed cameras and and tools to measure forces and drag just like they do in a wind tunnel, although I’m not sure given the forces in play in swimming (fairly low compared to cycling at 30+ mph) if they are sensitive enough to actually tell for sure which brand of goggles are fastest.
I’m sure an Olympic gold medal swimmer does not spend as much time in a flume as Lance spends in a wind tunnel but most if not all the US swimmers who medaled last summer had been in the flume in Colorado Springs at least once.
I wish we had water tunnels and could work on being optimal in the water.
You mean like this? (best picture I could find)
This was the “flume” that USA Swimming had at the OTC in Colorado Springs. Unfortunately, it was decommissioned a few years ago. The flume was 3 stories tall and circulated water up to some ungodly speed. Imagine an endless pool with huge propellers and vents to ensure you get as smooth a flow of water as possible.
It was inside of a pressure chamber, allowing them to do analysis at sea level instead of a mile high. I don’t think you can see it here, but they also had the breathing masks to do your CO2 analysis like they have for the dryland sports. There were glass panels for videoing on either side and one on the bottom. And they have software to convert your analyze your strokes. All in all, it was a helluva lot of fun. Especially the swim to failure, when they’d just up the pace every minute until you hit the webbing at the back!
Just based on watching the Olympic swimmers the swedes or socket rockets are probably the fastest.
Although Torres used some pretty big ones.
Swimmers are creatures of habit, and after training with the swedes and socket rockets (which really are surprisingly comfortable to wear for six hours in the pool a day) I suspect they just stick with the goggles they know and trust, and are in some cases very superstitous about, whenit comes to race day.