One of the most annoying habits that some companies have is selling different product ranges in different countries. I can fully understand this for things like electrical goods (110v just doesn’t work in Europe) and cars (US = left-hand drive, UK = right-hand drive), but for companies like Speedo I wonder just what the point is?

Swimming is swimming whether it be in the UK, Japan, New Zealand or the US so why not offer the same product range in each country? A bit of research shows that the hydrasuit style swimsuit is extremely popular. The original black zip back hydrasuit is one of the most popular swimsuits sold by proper swim stores and on Ebay, hydrasuit style swimsuits (especially patterned ones) go for prices up to £60+.

In the US, Speedo do a range of swimsuits called Flipturns, which include a number of patterned hydrasuit style swimsuits – I would love to get my hands on a few but it is hard to justify the international shipping costs. Please Speedo, start selling them in the UK too!!

» Read more: Speedo Flipturns Swimsuits

Beco – have you heard of them? Until today, I hadn’t and I thought I knew who all the manufacturers of hydrasuit style swimsuits were! Beco are a UK firm selling quite a range of swimsuits including a rear-zip hydrasuit style swimsuit (pictured). Their range caters mostly for leisure swimming and includes a wide selection of accessories – definately worth a look as their prices are pretty good!

I can’t comment on whether their version of the venerable hydrasuit is up there with Speedo’s, but it is certainly worth a go for the price of £24.95. Interesting to note that their sizes go up to 44 for this suit.

• » Read more: Beco Zip-back Swimsuit

Ok, so the year started out with not a lot of hydrasuit style swimsuits from Speedo. As the year went on, I kept on returning to the Speedo website but nothing came until the Hydrate 1 piece showed up. A great looking suit, that adds pink bars to the front/top through to the rear of the arm holes, and also features a front grey pattern to the chest area. The suit is made from the endurance range of fabric which takes quite a beating and lasts a good long time. The leg style of the Hydrate is medium. All in all, it does appear to be a great training swimsuit and for those who prefer a little less sun on the skin, a great suit for those days swimming in the sun (not that there are many of those left in the UK this year!).

There are few more pics on the next page of this post…

» Read more: Speedo Hydrate swimsuit

Well, hopefully not, but the one-piece collection at Speedo this year seems to be a little low compared to last year. I tend to have a look at their website once a week and it is disappointing not to see much change from week to week. They selling the old favourite hydrasuit in both black and blue colours, and the blaze hydrasuit with a cut-out lower back. It would be great to see some more colours for the original hydrasuit – perhaps something new like red, orange, bright blue or even white… oh well, one can but hope!

Cressi Swimsuit

I must admit that I feel a bit like a stranger on my own blog! It has been a busy last year with moving house, a busy job and lots of stuff generally. I managed to get away for a vacation back in September and got in a couple of days swimming in the sea off the south coast of the UK – surprisingly the water is so clear, just a bit on the cold side! The important bit is of course what I chose to wear!

Just a swimsuit would have been a little too cold, so went for a Speedo hydrasuit as the base layer, followed by a Cressi-Sub neoprene swimsuit and then finally an ONeill full wetsuit over the top.

I will find a “real” picture of the Cressi swimsuit and replace the stock image soon!

So, what is coming up this year? Not too much planned although hope to get a kayak at some point so am busy saving the pennies for that. Will give a lot more scope for water exploration and of course wearing swimsuits!

Happy swimming!

I thought finally to do a quick photoset of all my swimsuits, although as I write this, I have since added another 2 swimsuits to my collection. My collection ranges from standard leaderback swimsuits and hydrasuits, to some less commonly found swimsuits such as the Speedo hooded swimsuit (pictured left) and the Speedo long-sleeved swimsuit.

Originally, my collection started out with just hydrasuits and open back swimsuits and never really thought about adding coverup swimsuits such as the Speedo Splash knee suit, Glow kneesuit and Flower legsuit. Although as a child I sometimes wore sunsuits swimming whilst living in hot climates, such suits didn’t feature again until quite recently.

The other main type of swimsuit is the professional range such as the Fastskin suits. I have one of each main type of professional swimsuit – open back legsuit, sleeveless hydrasuit style legsuit, full body suit and a sleeveless hydrasuit style kneesuit. The only one I don’t have is the open back kneesuit – hopefully one day!

A couple of other specials are a Cressi-sub neoprene zip back swimsuit and a Barracuda neoprene zip back swimsuit (I have a few normal wetsuits but don’t count them as part of the collection!).

My collection continues to expand, but generally I focus on particular styles rather than having lots and lots of similar open back swimsuits, it is just too expensive to have one of each!

The collection can be viewed here and excluding any swimsuits bought since, stands at 33 suits!

I am pleased, and relieved, to say that the OnePieceSwim forum has now been merged with the Ayus-Zentai forum. Why? because managing two forums and keeping both spam free takes time, and I would rather spend that time enjoying the forums! OnePieceSwim enjoys it’s own area in the Ayus forum and has it’s own little identity. Already we have seen new people drop in and chat so I am glad that I finally got round to doing it!

A number of people have accounts on both forums – if you do, and you want the two accounts merged together, let me know via PM (to emjx) on the forum. You can access the forum here – enjoy!!

I was lucky enough to come across a couple more Speedo sunsuits/cover-up swimsuits, including the 2008 Splash Kneesuit (the pink one in the images adjacent and below) that I have been looking for ever since missing the chance to buy it when on sale at one of the online swim stores. The Glow kneesuit (the blue suit in the pictures) was an added bonus as I already have it in pink, but never seen it available in the blue (although it was shown in some Speedo product photos).

Will add some non-stock photos as soon as the new kneesuits arrive!