When I was in grade school, I was an unadulterated dork. I dressed up as anything from Captain Kirk to Peter Pan during Halloween, and regardless of the fact that I’ve traded Captain Kirk for Captain Morgan and Peter Pan’s youth and innocence for Peter Pan’s peanut butter and jelly, I remember those days fondly. I was into math. I was into English. I was into history and I was into science.

But in 1996, I was into mythology. I was into speed. I was into thinking that Michael Johnson was Hermes.

Remember those gold shoes? They glided across the grounds of Atlanta that year, putting on an air of invincibility. He owned the 400m. He defined the 200m. He became an American legend whose reputation has been subsequently secured as clean. For those three summer weeks, he was more than an Olympian—he was a bona fide Olympic god. To me and many others, the man was, indeed, the god of speed, donning footwear worthy of only a deity.

But here’s the thing about those gold shoes—they didn’t help him win the 200m, nor the 400m, nor anything else. Those gold shoes were a perhaps playful and perhaps ironic symbol befitting an athlete whose natural skill transcended his time. Now, instead of the gold shoes on the gold feet, we have the sleek swimwear on the sleek bodies. And this swimwear is not for show.

Jerry Greene of the Orlando Sentinel characterized the $500+ Speedo LZR (pronounced “laser”) Racer as “a full-body suit made from a seamless fabric that has the hydrodynamic characteristics of shark skin.” People from NASA worked on this thing. Since its introduction to swimming in February, 19 long-course and 4 short-course world records have been set. All but one record-holder wore the LZR. We might as well start handing out jet-packs to basketball players and Iron Man suits to running backs.

U.S. Olympic swim coach Mark Schubert said, “I wouldn't be surprised to see every world record broken at the Games, and hopefully we’ll get a big percentage of those.” Read that again: “…every world record…” There’s no other word to describe the LZR other than “tragic.” It’s fine for technology to supplement the athlete; for example, golf clubs have become more powerful and accurate. However, as the golf clubs have become bigger, so have the golf courses on which the golfers compete. It used to be a 250 yard drive on a 400 yard Par 4. Now it’s a 300 yard drive on a 450 yard Par 4. It’s becoming ever closer to a 350 yard drive on a 500 yard Par 4. The technology has advanced in golf, as have the athletes and the golf courses. It’s a perpetual progression that every facet of the game has undergone in mostly proportional fashion, not just driving the golf ball.

In swimming, the 50m freestyle is the 50m freestyle. The pool cannot be made to include barracudas as obstacles. As such, the meaning of what it is to be a “world record-holder” has been diminished, because the viewing public is entirely justified in wondering, “What would Mark Spitz have done in a Speedo LZR Racer?” This technology does not merely supplement the swimmer—it completely enhances the swimmer in ways that are unfair in the spirit of the competition. If every competitor wears the LZR at the Olympics, fine. Perhaps the playing field will be as level as it was sans-LZR, but the records will not mean a thing.

How is this swimwear different from steroids? In today’s ‘roid-laden competitive culture, there are those who would question the integrity of sprinters Tyson Gay and Usian Bolt, arguably the top two 100m competitors on the planet. Here’s an unassailable statement: if Gay and Bolt are someday found to be juicing, their records mean nothing. The steroids don’t merely supplement the sprinter—they completely enhance the sprinter in ways that are unfair in the spirit of the competition. And on we ago again in the same vein as the LZR should be approached.

I like swimmers who swim and sprinters who sprint. Give Michael Phelps a regular Speedo. Give Ben Johnson nothing but a weight room, a track, and Gatorade. Let’s see what these guys can do when the records are determined by the athletes and not the supplements. Unfortunately, any hope of such days hasn’t really existed in quite some time, and any sliver of hope that still lives is as good as dead.

That ten year-old boy in me still thinks that Michael Johnson is Hermes. And no matter how fast anyone sprints from here on out, he will never be supplanted. In this culture, the race is no longer sacred. Hermes never needed a syringe.