Feeling Free: Nineteen Frequency ElleSystem

I have never been a big fan of wetsuits; I would even go so far as to say that I pretty much hate them. I came to triathlon from a swimming background so other than using a wetsuit to stay warm in the water, I didn’t initially understand what benefits the wetsuit could have on someone’s swimming stroke. My first wetsuit was a sleeveless, and for a long time, I felt that I’d never match the free feeling of that suit.

Recently I took Nineteen’s Frequency wetsuit for a few test swims in Okanagan Lake. Having preconceived notions from some of my previous experiences, I was generally convinced that wetsuits are quite restrictive around the shoulder area, tight around the neck, and also rarely fit a women properly. It would be an understatement to say that I took on this task of testing Nineteen’s wetsuit with a hard attitude to change.

Sizing has always been a problem for me; even though I am a female, I have a relatively long torso and shorter legs and not a lot of curves. For the last four years I have worn a men’s extra small wetsuit because I found the women’s specific wetsuits didn’t fit me quite right. They all seem to short and/or tight in the torso length, and would then add extra stress on my shoulders because the suit wasn’t long enough. When I gave Steve Fleck at Nineteen wetsuits my measurements (and also mentioned my experience above) I was surprised when he wrote back and said that he thought I would fit the women’s small suit quite well. I really wasn’t convinced but was nevertheless interested in trying the women’s specific wetsuit (designed using what Nineteen calls the ElleSystem), since there is more than just the obvious differences between men and women that affect how things fit. Nineteen claims to be the 1st company to make women specific suit, and 50% of Nineteen wetsuit sales are generated by the sale of women’s suits.

Putting on the Frequency women’s small wasn’t too much of a challenge. It was tight but surprisingly stretchy at the same time, and I managed to pull the legs up without incident and then slip the arms on without using any special lubricants or devices. I pulled both legs and arms sleeves up as far as possible in order to have as much length through the torso and shoulders, as this was an area I was really concerned about. You need to have room to move through the torso and shoulders so you can get good range of motion through the rotation of the body and lifting of the shoulders.

Once the zipper was done up and I was standing on the beach, the suit did feel quite tight, a little tighter than I am used to. It felt too tight around the neck and pulled a bit between the small of my back in the back of my neck. In previous experiences this type of fit has decreased my ability to breathe. I thought to myself, “Yes, I knew it; this size wouldn’t fit me.” As I waded in the lake and started taking a few strokes, I was immediately surprised at how it did not feel tight in those aforementioned areas. My neck was fine and my shoulders were able to roll through my stroke quite nicely. I picked up the pace and did a few thousand meters. I could breathe with no problems whatsoever.

I have used it a few more times and now understand Nineteen’s idea behind creating the “Wingspan System,” for which they used 1.5 mm high-stretch panel all the way across the back (it “loops” underneath the zipper). It really made a difference to the way the wetsuit fit. I can honestly say I enjoyed the experience, maybe because I was expecting the worse, but also because it was very easy to swim in. While the Frequency felt too tight on while standing around, it did seem to have a lot of give and stretchiness to it while swimming. Despite that freedom, it never felt baggy or loose and was still very snug and did not allow a lot of water to enter. I read some of the technical details that Nineteen provided about the suit after the fact, and one of the features is a dual seal zipper. This means it has “additional internal seal on the inside next to the skin.”

Overall, I really felt like it had the capacity to give me great range-of-motion through the rotation and also allowed me to keep my regular body position. I find some wetsuits almost too buoyant and don’t allow you roll down into the water; the Frequency was quite the opposite. So even with a bad attitude to start and a conviction that there is no way a women’s specific suit was going to fit me, Nineteen’s frequency really felt good in the water.

For more information on Nineteen’s complete line of wetsuits, visit their website at NineteenWetstuits.com.