Wednesday, December 26, 2012

EVAN MORGENSTEIN: "when the thieves at FINA made a decision that they were going to get rid of the techsuits. What they did was they almost bankrupted several of the swimwear companies"


Natahn Jendrick does an amazing interview for Swimming World with sports agent, Evan Morgenstein. This is an insiders view as to how the industry conducts swim business and how terrible swimmers have it.

The techsuits were once criticized for being so cost prohibitive for poor families that they were an uworkable choice for swimmers. I wrote that this was a red herring so as to obfuscate the truth - most swim families are affluent and a simple rule to disallow techsuits at the junior level was quite acceptable on moral grounds. But some five years later a pair a jammers are actually costs more than the techsuits back in the day. (See that Speedo system cost that went nowhere. The costs therein were stratospheric)

Michael Phelps is gone, long live MichaelPhelps, blah, blah,blah: It is now time for techsuits to return from their exile and grow this sport. It's time that swimming not be dominated by one or two players but that the playing field is leveled just like the over sized tennis rackets leveled the playing field in tennis. Other sports have done much the same thing via technology to grow their ranks and bring in investment and so should swimming.

A snippet of what Evan had to say:
Evan: Oh it is terrible. I mean if you were a swimmer looking to make this a career. There could be a worse time to do it. You know unfortunately when the thieves at FINA made a decision that they were going to get rid of the techsuits. What they did was they almost bankrupted several of the swimwear companies and they have never recovered from that because they were so vested in that, but they actually hurt the sport and hurt the popularity of the sport. People love Olympics sports like swimming because of world records and although there were a couple of world records broken in London comparative to Beijing there was virtually no records broken and that is a shame. Technology changes in every other sport.

You know I noticed people don't want go back to the 1950s they love going to you know drive-in movies and you know the past is great, but the fact is when it comes to technology you can't stop, you have to keep moving forward and this isn't cheating right, you know the Lance Armstrong's of the world, this is technology and technology and shoes rackets whatever changes in every sport. Yet FINA singularly changed the sport and then once that happened the apparel companies had millions of dollars of inventory they couldn't sell.

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Nathan Jendrik: U.S. author, lecturer, model, photographer and celebrity personal trainer. Jendrick has written several books, although never attending college, primarily with/for celebrities and notable personalities. His first book, Dunks, Doubles, Doping was a USA Book News Award finalist. His literary properties were for a time represented by Mollie Glick at the Jean Naggar Literary Agency in New York, NY. In December 2004, Jendrick married Olympian Megan Jendrick.

13 comments:

Dean Jackson said...

Great to eventually hear how the swim brands were hurt , some beyond repair. While others now have had their fingers burned so bad that Investing in the category would be a tough call. Thanks for posting Tony and nice one Evan

Dean Jackson said...

Great to eventually hear how the swim brands were hurt , some beyond repair while others now have had their fingers burned. Investing in the category for many would be a tough call. Thanks for posting Tony

Tony Austin said...

Thanks Dean,

It's time FINA recognize that Phelps is gone, it's time they make the sport exciting again. Even TYR was put on the ropes and had to seek out new markets elsewhere.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, because it's Phelps who controls FINA and they banned the suits because he said so.
Riiight.

Tony Austin said...

Well, yes.. HE's right:

From Associated Press

ROME — Michael Phelps' coach has threatened to withhold the swimmer from international meets until FINA bans high-tech bodysuits.

Swimming's governing body, FINA, upheld a decision Tuesday to outlaw the suits next year, although the ban might not take effect until April or May — three or four months later than expected.

Told of the possible delay, Phelps' coach, Bob Bowman, said FINA better "do something or they're going to lose their guy who fills these seats..."

So, yeah, Phelps controlled FINA and USA Swimming

Tony Austin said...

Here is an article from ESPN stating just as much as well:

http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/swimming/news/story?id=4360589

Anonymous said...

Jaja.. sorry, friend, why do you censure so many of my comments?

Tony Austin said...

I don't censor any of them - they are not making it through, Jaja.

Anonymous said...

jaja.. OK, yesterday I sent this one:

The return of shiny suits?, nooo!.. in this matter I'm with Craig Lord

http://www.swimnews.com/news/view/8589

TedBaker said...

The tech suit is dead! Dead, dead, dead and deader still!

We just have just finished an amazing quadrennial that featured outstanding performances by equally outstanding athletes. Sun Yang's 1500, Rebaca Soni's 200 breast, Magnessen's 4710(!!) to name just a very few.

All of these accomplishments were due to the athletes' - and their coaches - hard work and dedication to craft, not to what they were wearing.

Best times and world records - the keystone of this sport - are back to meaning something. They are no longer some arbitrary number to be wiped out by the next random technological whimsy. You have to work - and work damm hard - get a best time let alone a world record. You can not - and never should have been able to - buy one.

Plus, the competition swimwear field is more open than ever!! USA Swimming ended their exclusive with Speedo, Arena is back in a huge way and Tyr is making great products & has the French Federation under contract. Jaked remains a niche player in Europe and Descent / Mizuno is big in Japan. (Me too: I'm huge in Japan! Love saying that.)

The signifigance of the end of the deal between Speedo and US Swimming can't be understated. It really opens the door to individual athletes to get their own deals with the suit companies.

The sport in the post-techsuit era is in great shape with an international cast of athletes and an absolute gem of a superstar - Missy Franklin - waiting to take center-stage.

Tony Austin said...

Sorry Ted, the tailors are at the gates. Legions of seamstresses are behind them. Legions, Ted, followed by a calvary of swimsuit models wearing new technological swim wear.

Oh, as for Missy Franklin, she i wearing a techsuit sir sans the zipper but their coming too and so is the winter of your discontent made glorious summer by this son of SCAQ!

;-)

TedBaker said...

Put some money on it. I'll bet you $50.00 - and I'll give you 2:1 - that techsuits will not return.

If they're back by the end of 2013, I'll donate $100.00 in your name to my local hospital. I win, you kick in $50.00 to yours in my name.

seo danışmanı said...


so true agree 100% thanks