Speedo's New Intelligent Swimsuit Mimics a Whale's Belly?

Speedo Fastskin 4.0 concept features an intelligent swimsuit that is 3D-printed for the user with adaptive buoyancy, customizable compression, and a texture of a whale's belly?

Speedo Fastskin Design

As mentioned earlier, Speedo is going for a new swimsuit that is dubbed "intelligent," and the reason for the texture of the whale's underbelly is to "improve times in the water."

As for now, the Fastskin 4.0 is just a concept and TechRadar says that it looks "pretty outlandish," however there are some individual design components that are certainly going to be a hit in competition swimsuits for the future.

Besides the very unique idea of using whale belly-esque texture for the swimsuit, there are notable features within the Fastskin 4.0, such as AI monitoring the athlete's vital signs to give better coaching mid-race and an exoskeleton that enhances muscular power for users within the pool, as per Gizmodo.

Fastskin 4.0's Future in The Olympics

Speedo pursued these ideas that when the features all come together, its technologies would not only improve but help the men's freestyle record break the 20-second barrier as well as the women's 100m breaststroke to fall below 60 seconds.

There isn't any mention of the use of exoskeletons yet for the Olympics but given the rules, it might not be greeted with applause as of now.

However, the swimwear doesn't seem to be implemented at this year's Tokyo Olympics as the rules for Olympic-level swimwear are undoubtedly strict. One of the rules stipulates that for pool swimming at temperatures above 18C, the swimsuits for men should not extend above the navel or below the knee.

As for women, the swimsuit must not cover the neck or extend past the shoulder or knee.

The material should be "regular and flat" and not have a buoyancy of 0.5 Newtons. This will spell trouble for Speedo's whale belly swimsuit in terms of its material of choice.

Custom 3D Printing LIkely a Future Possibility

Custom 3D printing can still be used in a competitive nature in the future since it uses recycled material. The Olympic Games continually push for the use of recycled materials such as scrap smartphones for their medals.

Also, Asics has recently released official sportswear for the Olympic games that include running shoes created from tons of wasted clothing that were gathered all around Japan.

As for the moment, Speedo's LZR Pure Intent and LZR Pure Valor racing swimsuits are other experiments from both companies that use fabric based on the research of shark scales. The suits are going to be used by the world's best swimmers later in the Tokyo Olympics, and maybe using a whale belly fashion swimsuit isn't about to be ruled out.

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Alec G.