From the 'Telegraph' - 'bluseventy' will launch legal action against FINA in the Swiss courts!

From the Telegraph.co.uk: "...Ten swimsuits were rejected while 136, including 11 Blueseventy designs, were deemed to require modifications. Manufacturers were given 30 days to make the necessary changes.

But Blueseventy insists it has been left in the dark about what modifications need to be carried out, despite repeated requests to FINA for clarification.

Blueseventy's designs were classified as suits that "may cause significant air trapping when worn by the swimmers", despite apparently passing FINA's thickness and buoyancy tests. ..."

After witnessing how USA Swimming conducts their business and how FINA conducts theirs, I am convinced that swimming our national governing bodies need a auditing done by the IOC and/or their respective governments.

Something as simple as swimsuits at the age-group level and beyond has turned into a "Hurricane Katrina-like" debacle swallowing up age-groupers, college swimmers, Olympians and Masters Swimmers, and even FINA officials in it's path.

[Link]

TYR Sport inc. vs USA Swimming/Speedo/Mark Schubert/Erik Vendt pre-trial ruling

I have uploaded the ruling for the pretrial motions in the TYR versus USA Swimming/Speedo/Mark Schubert/Erik Vendt lawsuit to my personal website for downloading.

I ask humbly for others to upload it to their sites too or just go ahead and post the whole 26 pages so my personal site won't get so hammered.

Here is a link to the PDF: [Link]

Now, I am going to drop an opinionated bomb here and I hope FINA is reading. This is my opinion only: If any paid Speedo endorser was on the voting tribunal that decided which suits should be FINA approved and which suits should not be approved, please take note that the same antitrust situation that USA Swimming is having to defend against could be applicable to FINA if European law is similar to that of US law.

Nullify that vote if this is the case!

Let me phrase it this way - I suspect a class action suit is not out of the question if it means Jaked, blueseventy, Diana and others are "run out of town" over a "paid-vote" or two rather than straight science!

Update from yesterday:

Why this lawsuit is not as Craig Lord says, "...on the fringe of the current suits crisis," but rather at "grand zero" is that According to TYR, Speedo is being accused of setting up USA Swimming as a covert marketing arm for it's products so as to set up a de facto monopoly in the high-end suit market.

The judge seems to agree with 9-out-of-10 assertions that this is the case. Most notably the hiring a paid endorser of Speedo; (Coach Mark Schubert), to convince the USA Olympic Swim Team to wear nothing but Speedo. According to TYR, blatant lies were used to sell swimmers such as Erik Vendt that this was the case.

With that said, One has to ask, and certainly Craig Lord isn't asking this, is Speedo doing this same nonsense with FINA and is FINA merrily buying into, or being handsomely "bought" into doing this?

Craig Lord writes an article for the 'Times Online' regarding 'Adidas' threatening to leave the swimsuit market.

Update, I jumped on the Craig to hard but to his credit the article has been amended.

Congratulations to Craig Lord! but his over-simplification of the TYR versus USA Swimming lawsuit is simply biased.

He writes: "...TYR, which spent three years and several million dollars developing its Tracer Rise suit, filed an antitrust lawsuit in California in May, accusing Speedo, USA Swimming and its national team head coach Mark Schubert (who said in support of the LZR that swimmers had a “black-and-white decision: the money or the medal”) of conspiring to block competition...." [Link]

He does not mention that Stu Isaac*, the director of marketing for Speedo, has confirmed that Schubert is paid to endorse Speedo. Hence the legal challenge, in my opinion, is legitimate amog other evidence not mentioned int he article. [*reference: June 28th, In the New York Times Blog: RINGS 2008 Beijing Olympics and Paralympics, Karen Crouse]

FINA will meet in February with sales representatives and swim industry leaders to discuss a solution out of this speedsuit mess. I am sure they will "split the baby" and walk a fine line between the swimsuit business and national governing bodies.

Now that Nike has left the speedsuit market and Adidas is threatening, there is a potential to see the swimmers themselves hurt the most since fewer swimsuits means fewer sponsors and what sponsors are left will have no incentive to pay more.

FINA has a lot of political work to do in February: Adidas has to be pacified, Nike has to be addressed and I hope they send a rep. Then, national governing bodies have to be convinced to allow speedsuit makers a market to sell to or there will be less incentives, or even manufacturers left to sponsor both athletes and meets.

'AM Lawyer Daily' - 'Speedo LZR' claims by Mark Shubert, challenged in a TYR lawsuit deposition!

Summary: The TYR lawsuit against USA Swimming et al. is moving forward and Kevin Youkilis of the American Lawyer Daily writes that in "... the deposition of Genadijus Sokolovas, USA Swimming's former director of physiology, ... Sokolovas said that Schubert's [Speedo LZR] comments; were "pure speculation" without any science to back them up...."

For some background on the TYR lawsuit itself, here is some info from an L.A. Times article by Lisa Dillman posted on May 15 2008:

"...In documents filed in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, TYR alleges that Speedo, USA Swimming and Schubert “combined to engage in a campaign of falsely disparaging the products of Speedo’s competitors, including TYR, for the purpose of inducing competitive swimmers to refrain from doing business with Speedo’s competitors” and that it was done in an “especially insidious and deceptive manner.”

TYR attorney Lawrence J. Hilton said the company made several efforts to settle the matter and that TYR’s founder, former U.S. Olympic swimmer and medalist Steve Furniss, took this step with “great reluctance.” ..."

[Link]

Mark Schubert, USA Swimming Olympic Team Coach, is also quoted here in the TimesOnline.Uk.co on April 9, 2008 as saying the following :

“My advice to athletes is, ‘You have a black-and-white decision - the money or the gold medal.' And it's going to be a real test of character.

“There is no doubt the suit makes a difference and there is no doubt that there is one manufacturer that's put millions into research while the other manufacturers are more into fashion. Nobody at this level [world-class athletes] can afford to give up 2 per cent. It is not rocket science. ...” -- Mark Schubert

[Link]

On June 28th, In the New York Times Blog: RINGS 2008 Beijing Olympics and Paralympics, Karen Crouse wrote this about Mark Schubert's realtionship with Speedo

"...What he did not mention is that the defendants, in asking for a continuance, provided sworn testimony from Stu Isaac, the director of marketing for Speedo, confirming that Schubert is paid to endorse Speedo and that one of Isaac’s jobs is to manage Speedo’s relationship with USA Swimming. ..."

[Link]

Kevin Youkilis, of the American Lawyer Daily is following it and this is what he wrote:

"... TYR, the industry's number two company, sued USA Swimming and Speedo for conspiring to squelch competition by promoting Speedo's $500, NASA-engineered full-body suit over TYR's similar product. (The suit centered around USA Swimming head coach Mark Schubert's public and private comments that Speedo's suit made swimmers 2 percent faster than rival swimwear.)

Last Tuesday, TYR's legal team at Hewitt & O'Neil filed a huge batch of papers, including the deposition of Genadijus Sokolovas, USA Swimming's former director of physiology, in which Sokolovas said that Schubert's comments were "pure speculation" without any science to back them up...."

[Link]

'NIKE' pulls out of swimwear battle! - This is why the Speedo/USA Swimming monopoly accusations may be credible!

CNBC: ...In a somewhat surprising move, Nike has pulled out of the Olympic swimwear market

Sources told CNBC that, last week, officials with the world's largest shoe and apparel maker told college swim coaches who they have contracts with, that the company would no longer be developing the latest and greatest for championship swimmers. Those suits, for obvious reasons, are used by swimmers at the majority of top programs whose coaches have a Nike contract. ..." [Link]

Nike is done with us and we came so close to having their marketing muscle popularize our sport! As a painful result, Nike swimmers are now unemployed and that includes Olympic hero, Jason Lezak, whose friends are going to hold a fund raiser for him so that he can continue to swim for us and represent the United States in the 2009 FINA World Championships of Swimming in Rome: [Link]

I am setting up a donation button for him soon thanks to Paul Carter and Club Assistant.

Rant: I predicted that the covert product placement by Speedo within the USA Swimming ranks could have some swimsuit manufacturers just quitting and leaving the speedsuit market altogether; I didn't think it would be Nike.

For instance: USA Swimming Olympic Team Coach, Mark Shubert, who is also an employee of Speedo, is categorically quoted in a TYR lawsuit brief on page 8 - Line 6, stating that the Speedo LZR would give a swimmer a "2% advantage" over any other suit. He provided no documentation to verify his claim and the next paragraph contains another gem: "I would strongly advise them to wear the [LZR] at trials or they may end up at home watching it on NBC. ..."

Here is the legal brief that TYR filed with all the quotes therein: [Link]

For USA Swimming to allow this statement to be made despite documented suit malfunctions, and no documentation to verify the "2% faster claim," they essentially told the global market that USA Swimming endorses only the Speedo LZR. (Also note that Speedo is the only suit manufacturer allowed to advertise with USA Swimming properties which include both their magazine and website.)

In my opinion the consequences are as follows: a bunch of NIKE swimmers just lost their jobs as a result of this covert product placement for the LZR and the ramifications may ripple.

So, has Speedo and USA Swimming poisoned the marketing waters for every other speedsuit manufacturer by getting a National Governing Body with the weight of the USA behind it to endorse the LZR? A jury will decide and Speedo better hope I don't get picked as a member of that jury.

Thorpe sues France! - (France as a defendent is easier to spell than the French paper and the journalist that he is actually suing.)

Gosh it's late, and Wendy from www.off-the-deep-end.blogspot.com sent me this link well before anybody had it this morning. Unfortunately, I had to watch this "scoop" mold into yesterday's fish-wrap because my stupid life got in the way.

Thorpe is still pissed-off about French paper named L'Equipe and a writer therein accusing him of an irregular doping test. Thorpe is suing for defamation and more!

Snippet from RTE: "... Thorpe's lawyer Tony O'Reilly had informed the New South Wales Supreme Court of this on Monday and said that the proceedings would include a claim for infringement of privacy, the statement said.

The court proceedings were adjourned until September 22, when it was expected that preparations would be made for a hearing some time next year, the statement said, adding that no further comment would be made...." [Link]

He is suing in an Australian court - How is that going to work?

'Speedo' admits paying USA Olympic Swimming Coach Mark Shubert to endorse Speedo!

TYR is suing Speedo and USA Swimming for anti-trade practices which in my opinion are so obvious and so overt it boggles my mind that the only press publications being objective about this lawsuit are coming from outside the swimming spectrum. TYR is being portrayed as the villain and Speedo the poor, innocent, innovator. See SwimNews if you don't believe me.

With that said the L.A. Times has been quite fair with this lawsuit: here are some restated quotes about TYR's management practices from Coach Mark Shubert from an L.A. Times article:

"... USA Swimming's head coach, Mark Schubert, took jabs at TYR Sport, which is suing him, USA Swimming, Warnaco Swimwear Inc. -- the parent company of Speedo -- and swimmer Erik Vendt in connection with the LZR Racer swimsuit. The antitrust lawsuit alleges that there was a conspiracy to steer swimmers to Speedo.

Schubert, who has steadfastly refused to comment on the lawsuit, Saturday took pains to compliment Nike, which has been allowing its sponsored athletes to experiment with high-tech suits from other manufacturers. He said Nike shows it wants its athletes to succeed. ..." [Link]

Now, consider this: Mark Shubert set up a quasi-demonstration of the LZR in Manchester, England at the FINA SCM Championships. The meeting was mandatory and according to the TYR lawsuit brief, some athletes felt "hard sold." If Shubert is all for swimsuit choice, then why didn't he demo all the swimsuits so they could "...experiment with high-tech suits from other manufacturers" and why did he just demo the Speedo?

Now compare his credibility as a unbiased coach and a moral authority in regards to swimsuit choice in a court filling by a Speedo exec in regards to the Speedo lawsuit. From the L.A. Times:

".... But an earlier filing, a declaration attached from Stu Isaac, a Speedo senior vice president, stated that Schubert is a paid spokesman for the company, which backs up TYR's assertion.

Now I read the Ted Stevens Act twice through today. The Stevens Act summarily created the concept of National Governing Body status. In my opinion, USA Swimming is not a business like the NFL or the NBA. Those organizations are businesses and can use their for-profit status to endorse, or forward the aims and interests of those that pay them "mad bank" to do so.

It's my interpretation that National Governing Bodies such as USA Swimming can't use their non-profit status as a for-profit engine so as to set up swimsuit monopolies for those such as Speedo or anybody else. USAS is a non-profit governing body set up by the United States Senate. What USAS overtly or covertly endorses essentially is endorsed by the auspices of the US government. It can't be done in my opinion.

Now for my tastes, the proper way for an endorsement deal to take place would be for USAS to state out loud that Speedo pays their bills and then state they are thankful for the cash but they won't say which suit is the best then I could live with that.

So, the TYR case has been moved to September 15th. How coincidental that is is after the games.

Premier Management Group makes a statement!

Evan Morgenstein is the president of a company called Premier Management Group, They are a sports talent agency who represent everybody from Amanda Beard to Erik Vendt. Obviously their job is to negotiate the best deal they can for the athletes they represent and now they refuse to do business with TYR.

Morgenstein sent out an email to SwimNews which stated: "I felt like it was time as a company to make a statement. We will continue to work with our athletes who work with TYR and make sure they get what they need, but in the future we will not be pursuing them." [Link]

He goes on to say that Erik Vendt did NOT violate his contract by wearing a Speedo at the Long Beach Grand Prix while under contract with TYR and after hearing that I sincerely think that any sophisticated reader has questions about that statement.

Morgenstein predicts a backlash from the swim community over this treatment of Vendt and he couldn't be more right about a backlash but it isn't going to be about Erik Vendt. It is going to be, and has been, all about USA Swimming for-profit deals.

One such deal with the Wasserman Media Group led to the pulling of Flowswimming's Floswimming's media credential which annoyed not just the bloggers but just about every swimmer that has ever been to Flowswimming's Floswimming.

We're going to be seeing a backlash from swim suit manufacturers too; (starting with this TYR lawsuit), who do not appreciate a non-profit, National Governing Body favoring one brand over another due to the amount of cash that particular brand pours into the USA Swimming's coffers.

For instance USAS allows no other swimsuit company save for Speedo to advertise in their Splash Magazine. Speedo has banner ads on the USAS site, a Speedo branded tip of the week article and recently we have all heard the National team coach seriously pimp Speedo while never mentioning that he was on the Speedo payroll. (See TYR Brief).

The aforementioned is a big deal for legally, a non-profit is not allowed to profit from the subject of their non-profit. That is why teachers have bake sales instead of tutoring students in exchange for cash. Hence, USA Swimming can't let this go to court. If they do then a judge will tear into their bank account and neither Congress nor FINA would like that.

I suspect this lawsuit will be settled before Beijing or else the public will see how USAS does business. Though I am hoping we do!

So, unlike Swim Network which is owned by the Wasserman Media Group, or Swim News that is very pro Speedo, I am rooting for TYR since this isn't about Speedo, it's about the for-profit tactics of USAS.

Here is a Reuters overview: [Link]

Mark Shubert claims the 'Speedo LZR' would give a swimmer a 2% advantage over any other suit.

In the TYR lawsuit brief mentioned in the previous post, Mark Shubert is categorically quoted on page 8 - Line 6, stating that the Speedo LZR would give a swimmer a "2% advantage" over any other suit.

What does a "2% advantage" mean and how was that number quantified?

Will you finish all your races in a time that is 2% faster than ever before?

Does it mean that a Speedo Lzr is simply 2% more "slippery" or more hydrodynamic than any other suit on the market?

The math doesn't support it and there is no way that Mark Shubert was able to test a Tracer Light, Tracer Rise, blueseventy pointzero3, or an Arena Powerskin R-Evolution in a plume or wind tunnel.

Pieter van den Hoogenband's set a world record in the 100 LCM free at the Sydney games in a time of 47.84. If you then compare it to Alain Bernard's world record set at the European LCM Championships last month in a time of 47.50, that is not even a single percentage point faster but rather a 0.07% reduction. It's impressive but it is not 2%.

In the 50 free the time differential between Popov-2000 and Bernard-2008, we see a .98% reduction. Again, this is not a 2% differential. Michael Phelps dropped his 200 back time by the same percentage in just 4 years without a Speedo Lzr.

Shubert's 2% claim is an extraordinary one and it demands extraordinary proof.

LA TIMES: 'TYR' sues 'Speedo' and 'USA Swimming', Coach Mark Schubert and Erik Vendt

UPDATE: Here is the legal brief that TYR filed: [Link]

Thank you so much to the reader who sent it!

I am going to try and get the brief and post it. I am no lawyer but I think TYR has a case. A huge one and USA Swimming will be forced to capitulate or face the consequences of their "for profit" ventures presented to the public at large. Most notably that USA Swimming is not allowed to profit from the subject of their non-profit status and yet they are doing just that.

As for Mark Shubert who is coach of the USA Team - This snippet to me illustrates an ethically severe conflict of interest on Shubert's part if this allegation is true. Especially note the part in bold. Here is a snippet: "... before the LZR debuted, the court papers said. His enthusiasm extended to what was called a mandatory team meeting at the Short Course World Championships in Manchester, England in April, telling swimmers that they would "have a two percent advantage if they wore the Speedo LZR technology," according to the lawsuit.

"Schubert also arranged to have a fitting session during the mandatory team meeting where athletes were instructed on how to fit the Speedo LZR suit and position the LZR suit to the body," the complaint said. "TYR-sponsored athletes in attendance expressed discomfort at Schubert's unsolicited comments."

Speedo has long been linked to USA Swimming, in a commercial sense, and in court papers TYR maintains that Schubert "is a paid spokesman for Speedo. ..."

( Read as a PAID spokesperson for Speedo being PAID to tell the American team in Manchester, England during a mandatory meeting that the product he is being PAID to represent is 2% better than any other suit and that they should wear it.)

As for USA Swimming: Here are three reasons why they may be acting in economic interests rather than in the interests of producing good swimmers:

1) Wasserman Media Group "Marketing deal"
2) Speedo endorsement deal - Speedo Tip of the Week
3) Spanking Floswimming for actually promoting swimming.

As for Erik Vendt: If you promise to wear a suit in exchange for a salary; you wear it. Embarrassing your sponsor not only tarnishes their name, but makes you a potentially fatal brand investment down the line. Also, there is that breech of contract thingy!

Here is a link to Lisa Dillman's article at the L.A. Times: [Link]

Photo above came from non-governmental body, non-profit, USA Swimming.org