Joann Bally CSCS
Ergogenic aids in sports are substances or gear, outside the requirements for sports activity, that help improve performance beyond that expected from genetics, training, and luck. Supplements can be ergogenic aids, as can nutritional regimens. Exterior or mechanical aids are such things as the bench shirts and knee wraps that power lifters use, football players’ gloves, and high tech swim suits.
There is little doubt that the space-age suits help the swimmer go faster. There have been about 150 world records set in the last 18 months. Eleven world records were broken in the first two days of this year’s world championships. Michael Phelps lost the 200-m freestyle to a German swimmer named Paul Biedermann. Biedermann set a new world record in that race. He was wearing this year’s ergogenic suit while Phelps was contractually obliged to wear last year’s suit (made by his sponsor). Phelps was gracious, saying his loss in that race was due to the performance of the other swimmer, not the suit.
We don’t really know who would have won that race if they both had been wearing swim trunks from Target, but I think most of us would agree that world records should last more than a few days. These swimmers are great athletes, but they are being overshadowed by technology, and that cheapens the sport. FINA, swimming’s governing body, is taking steps to ban certain high-tech suits, but the ban won’t take effect until next year, and we can’t be sure companies won’t find something new that isn’t covered.
None of this is good news for the talented young swimmer who can’t afford to compete in the latest ergogenic aid. Sports fans don’t help much when they come to expect records in every event (or longer steroid-driven home runs). I don’t know that professional sports were ever all that pure, but amateurs still play for fun. It may be too late to keep big money out of high school and college sports, but the average exerciser can still play for fun and fitness, and we should.
HEALTHandFITNESS.com 
