(PhysOrg.com) -- Swimmers from around the world are setting world and Olympic records in Beijing this month and most are doing it wearing a swimsuit made of fabric tested at NASA.
Using the Nasa Fabric suit,Speedo's LZR Race, used in the actual event by Michael Phelps has now won more Olympic gold medals than any athlete in the modern era.
"I'm paying very close attention to the swimmers' times," said Wilkinson. "I'm amazed that so many athletes are wearing a fabric I tested in a laboratory in Hampton, Virginia."
But the big question is how did the Nasa inventor ,aerospace engineer Steve Wilkinson did it. He said that "We evaluated the surface roughness effects of nearly 60 fabrics or patterns in one of our small low speed wind tunnels," said Wilkinson. "We were assessing which fabrics and weaves had the lowest drag. The tests have generally shown the smoother the fabric, the lower the drag."
Speedo's research and development team, Aqualab, takes the results and uses them to help create advanced "space-age" swimsuit designs.
Michael Phelps won 8 gold medals in Beijing Olympics.
Courtesy Fabric 101's Blog.http://fabricsguide.blogspot.com
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