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Comment by fainpul | Hacker News Reader

Reminds me of the fascinating efficiency of fish, where even a dead fish can swim upstream, given the right kind of vortices.

I wonder how much potential for improvement there still is for the human body.

https://fyfluiddynamics.com/2018/07/when-i-was-a-child-my-fa...

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IIRC, the backstroke races at the 1996 Olympics were pushing the boundaries of human potential as competitors swam some or all of the races underwater. The optics of an underwater race were not good (ha!). As a result, FINA made it mandatory to surface and compete in actual backstroke instead of underwater dolphin kick.

the backstroke rule change was circa 1988. They changed butterfly (and I suppose freestyle) after the 96 Olympics when Dennis Pankratov won both butterflies with this technique. Interestingly, the backstroke innovator who probably triggered the earlier rule change got beat in the final by someone not using it (Berkhoff in 88, silver)

The latest rule change in this area was banning dolphin kicks on your back on the breast-to-free exchange in IM. Ryan Lochte triggered that one.

According to the article it was 1998...

"That all changed in 1998, when FINA, the world governing body of competitive swimming, ruled that swimmers performing the backstroke had to surface after 15 meters."

... which aligns with my recollection of the '96 Olympics and being gobsmacked at how long the swimmers were holding their breath.

The article is wrong. That’s when they changed it for fly/free.

Here is the 92 backstroke final. The announcers mention the rule: https://youtu.be/FTfTyzkSzQs?si=E82rvKql-w9vuwSf

I tried to find 96 and cannot but it was the same.

Here is the butterfly performance in 96 that ultimately triggered them to chamge it for fly/free: https://youtu.be/Zp2NTFjeXQQ?si=e_E-D1ZAvzNmjACe

I haven't seen that final in 29 years, thanks.

Pankratov's start really was incredible. His lungs have to be off the scale.

They would swim the entire 50m underwater, if given the chance. I've seen them do so in practice, very lazy-looking dolphin kicks, but still faster than most swimmers on the surface.

What improvements are you thinking?

I see three avenues:

1) Clothing - Already banned in the Olympics

2) Medication - Also officially banned in the Olympics but the Enhanced Games look like a promising test bed.

3) Go full Cult Mechanicum?

I was thinking of optimized movement patterns to increase efficiency / reduce wasted energy. This numberphile video explains how fish and other swimming animals barely lose any energy, even though they create vortices, because the vortices are in turn used to propel the fish forward.

https://youtu.be/wYDh5d9pfu8?si=TkPs2xcngduz_Qem&t=600

growing your body optimized for swimming. The training is one thing. I mean shaping your body into the hydrodynamically optimized form, like say growing some muscles (or fat - shaping yourself into a more dolhpin like shape :) here and there mostly for the purpose of better resulting hydrodynamic shape. With the medicine advances it may start earlier in life and be non-catchable by the sports authorities.

And, if you look at one of the Chinese Olympic winners last year - the wave in front of him was significantly smaller than in front of anybody else. Have no idea how he achieved that though.

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