Superior performance, quality products, transparency and ethical and fair business practices have been Arena’s key values since its inception forty years ago.
Consistent with these principles, all Arena products are designed and manufactured using the most innovative technologies and applying strict quality controls to ensure the highest consumer satisfaction for performance, quality and safety.
In February 2013, FINA, the international governing body for all aquatic sports, requested compliance information regarding one of the Arena POWERSKIN Carbon-Pro racing suits (woman full body open back – FINA approval code AR220993), purchased during routine testing.
Arena immediately launched an additional quality control investigation on a broad scale, showing that all raw materials used to manufacture all models in the POWERSKIN Carbon-Pro product family are fully compliant with FINA rules and regulations. Deeper checks suggested that a change in the manufacturing process, following a significant surge of market demand, may have caused an unintended – and unexpected – reduction of the permeability to air of some of the racing suits produced between the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013.
Only part of the production is affected by the anomaly, which has absolutely no impact either on the safety or on the performance of the products that are potentially non-compliant.
Nevertheless, as it would be impractical to test all POWERSKIN Carbon-Pro racing suits on the market, Arena wants to ensure that not even one non-compliant suit will be used in any FINA official competition.
Arena, therefore, advised FINA of its decision to withdraw the approval codes of concerned POWERSKIN Carbon-Pro models:
AR220993 – woman full body open back
AR220994 – woman full body closed back
AR141364 – man jammer
Consequently, as of May 7 onwards, all POWERSKIN Carbon-Pro suits to be used in FINA sanctioned events will have the following approval codes:
AR221039 – woman full body open back
AR221028 – woman full body closed back
AR141028 – man jammer
A complete list of all Arena racing suits approved by FINA can be found at fina.org.
Arena has already started delivering the new version of POWERSKIN Carbon-Pro suits (Mark 2) to Teams and Individual Swimmers, in view of forthcoming FINA events.
“Arena apologizes for any inconvenience – said Cristiano Portas, Arena CEO – but its commitment to fully comply with FINA rules and, more broadly, its commitment to fair competition in the world of swimming must be given the highest priority”.
Additionally, athletes competing in both Charlotte and at Master’s Nationals this weekend will have their suit needs met by an Arena rep on site.
This is an unedited press release via swimwear company Arena USA. SwimSwam spoke with Arena early this morning, and we will update this post as new information develops.
I have a Powerskin Carbon Pro. But they have now said it cant be refunded if you havent procesed a request before 30/09/2013 . I have but they havent got back to me !!!
sorry about that comment ^^^^^^^^^^ i forgot to say the cozzie i wanted how much does the powerskin carbon pro 2 cost
how much do they cost in australian dollars please need answers or tell me where i can find it thanks!!!!
I paid extra for the Arena White Hot suit which is now illegal. Will the replacement be for the same color or at least an exclusive color? This suit cost $50.00 more than the blue / red yellow Carbon Pro.
I feel so bad for all of these high school kids in Southern California who are so concerned about a suit when a suit may not make a difference at all. There are some meet administrators at CIF who do not follow the written instructions, who do not go by the electronic scoreboard or the pickles or the stop watches, but gets a time from the athletes coach in order to advance the athlete to finals.
Good luck to the CIF swimmers and keep your eyes open and your cameras rolling!
These suits should not be allowed at high school meets in the first place. It’s not impressive watching a relay from a wealthy neighborhood outfitted with expensive suits racing against kids from poorer communities in workout suits. Former college swimmers should not have to track down used competition suits to outfit kids on a high school team who advanced to CIF but cannot afford a suit.
Arena,
Thank you for trying to make this situation right. I have the original box and the bank statement from the debt card that was used to purchase the suit, will this be sufficient for the exchange? Since the item is non-returnable the tags etc. have been discarded.
Thank you,
Marcie
Why don’t they just bring back the full body suits? I fon’t see anything wrong with everybody having one. It makes the sport a lot more interesting and more people would watch.