Racing the rulebook: What swimming’s banned super suit teaches us about patent strategy

With the 2026 Commonwealth Games underway, Singaporean sport fans have plenty to be excited about, given the nation’s proud history at the Games. After all, it was at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow that Joseph Schooling first put Singapore swimming on the map, where he won silver in the 100m butterfly. As the Commonwealth Games return to Glasgow twelve years on, expectations in Singapore are high that its swimmers will once again convert strong performances in the pool into medals.

Yet there is another story running alongside the drama of competition. Less visible than the athletes themselves but no less fascinating, it concerns what is actually allowed in the water with them.

Earlier this year, swimmers at the inaugural Enhanced Games in Las Vegas raced in custom-built versions of the full-body suits that controversially dominated the pool back in 2008 and 2009 before being banned. Likewise, swimmers in this year’s Commonwealth Games will be wearing suits that descend directly from the suits banned close to 20 years ago. The interesting part is not that one event allows the use of the technology while the other does not, but rather that the technology never really left the pool at all. It simply changed focus, continued to evolve, and remained patent-protected long after the ban took effect.

What actually got banned?

In 2008, Speedo launched the LZR Racer, which was developed with help from NASA and used polyurethane panels that compressed the body and trapped air for buoyancy, as well as using patterned panels in the suit to reduce drag. Swimmers wearing it took 23 of the 25 world records set at the Beijing Olympics that year. Rivals raced to keep up, releasing their own full-polyurethane suits, and world records kept falling at a rate the sport had never seen before.

Swimming's governing body FINA (now World Aquatics) felt it had to step in. From January 2010, competition suits had to be made from textile materials only, with strict limits on buoyancy. The rule change was not directed at the entirety of the new suit technology, but rather at one specific route to speed: buoyancy that is created by a non-textile, air-trapping material (e.g. polyurethane). All other parts of the technologies that made up the LZR Racer were still fair game (i.e. compression, seams, and water-repellent surfaces) as long as they were built from a woven fabric.

The industry adapted fast

That distinction shaped everything that followed. Speedo had a fully compliant suit on the market within the year, and manufacturers have continued to innovate ever since. New patents covering racing suits have continued to emerge from Speedo, Arena and TYR suits to name a few, and have included innovations such as seamless back panels and a tension-band construction, rather than an air-trapping material. Today's racing suits evolved directly from the suits that were prohibited under the 2010 rule changes, achieving a similar effect through compression rather than buoyancy.

Importantly, Speedo's original 2007 patent for the LZR (e.g. EP1935265B1) was not actually directed to the use of polyurethane or similar buoyant materials. Instead, its main claims focused on panels placed onto a suit to cut drag, without specifying what the panels must be made of. While polyurethane is mentioned as a possible material for the panels, this is not in the main claims, so the use of any material (i.e. a woven textile) that could achieve the same effect could be used instead and still fall within the scope of the granted patent. This means that the underlying idea, namely, panels positioned to reduce drag, survived the ban intact. Only the specific material used in the suits had to change.

Anyone protecting early-stage research faces exactly the same question, potentially years before a market or a regulator exists: should I cover the product as it exists now, or look for a more general expression of the underlying technology that may still be patentable, and which may cover my eventual commercial product? This is a good illustration of why striking the right balance between your initial idea and breadth is important when having claims drafted for your invention – the eventual product may look very different to your initial concept, either due to commercial or regulatory changes forced upon you. That is, investing in good claim drafting can preserve value even when regulations or commercial needs change.

Did the Enhanced Games make a difference to the original technology?

As noted above, the industry focused on other aspects of the underlying technology to develop compliant swimsuits that still passed on some of the advantages of the original LZR Suits.

Interestingly, many of the original LZR patents lapsed from 2017 up to 2024, the latter being shortly after the Enhanced Games revived interest in the banned-style suits in 2023. However, as the industry has moved on, the original suits were reportedly difficult to obtain, and so custom versions were created instead. This serves as a reminder that technologies sidelined by regulation may still retain commercial value and legal protection years after any regulatory ban. While this may normally apply to the use of a product in a different field, that is not always the case, as the revival of the original LZR suit technology shows. However, it is also important for those considering reviving a “banned” technology to consider whether there may be patents in force that still cover the “new” versions of these suits, which may cause issues with any attempt to commercialise them.

Lessons for business owners, investors and research teams

A few things here are worth remembering well beyond the pool.

• Regulation that bans one specific feature of a product rarely kills the whole idea. It usually urges innovation elsewhere, resulting in the next burst of competition in the product category.
• Broad patent protection around the underlying inventive concept is generally more resilient to regulatory change than protection focused only on today’s implementation. That said, broad claims may be harder to grant, and while narrower claims may be granted quicker, these may be easier to design around. Finding the right balance requires careful strategic planning – both when drafting and in working out how to maximise your protection over the lifetime of a patent.
• For anyone assessing a company from the outside, this is as much a commercial diligence question as a legal one. If the product's edge depends on one specific technical mechanism, it is worth asking what happens to that edge, and to the underlying rights, if a regulator later restricts that exact mechanism rather than the product category as a whole. This may give new areas worthwhile exploring – particularly in areas of industry subject to regulatory oversight.
• As long as the patents are still in force, technology that gets sidelined by a rule change does not lose its patent protection just because nobody is using it. If a market for it reappears later, even in an unexpected place, those still-active rights can suddenly matter again and cause issues for third parties eager to exploit the older technology.

Sixteen years on, the technology behind swimming’s most notorious suit continues to influence the sport. While the original suits are no longer permitted in the Commonwealth Games, many of the innovations they introduced have found their way into approved suits and for use outside competition. The original concept never truly disappeared.

If your business or research is built on technology in a market where the regulatory landscape could shift faster than your protection strategy can keep pace, we would be glad to talk it through.

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