Arena: Suit & Customer Fail

7 May 2025

I wrote about the catastrophic fail of my practically brand new Arena Powerskin Carbon Glide tech suit, tearing dramatically after only 3 races in my recent race report.

I used to be a big Arena fan growing up, even racing in their matching suit and Lycra caps back in the 1980s, but I migrated towards Speedo during my University of Texas racing days. Since coming back to Masters a quarter of a century ago, I've raced in practically every tech suit maker on the market - TYR (most often), Blueseventy (in the rubber suit heydey), Jaked, A3, Finis, Speedo and probably some others. But, for some reason, I had not tried an Arena suit.

With my prior A3 and TYR tech suits ready for retirement, I made an effort to shop for a new tech suit earlier this year. I figured I'd try "low-end" tech suits / high-end Lycra suits from both Speedo and Arena first:

• Arena Powerskin ST NEXT Jammer

• Speedo Fastskin LZR Ignite Jammer

I wore these suits (roughly in equal proportions) over 14 different events across four different competitions between February and April. While I liked them both, I had more better swims in the Arena suit than the Speedo suit** so I purchased the aforementioned suit directly from Arena, spending £224 (about US$300). When I got the suit, I read all the instructions and even watched their video for how to put said suit on.

Then, I raced in it and loved it.

Then, it tore and I was angry.

Then, I wrote their customer service and I got infuriated with their response:

Now, mind you, I had shared my swimming story. I had shared my extensive experience wearing tech suits from all sorts of brands. I was (at least on my initial request) polite, closing my email with:

I have been a competitive swimmer for over 50 years and have been wearing tech suits as part of big Masters Swimming events for the past 20+ years. I have never, ever had a suit fail after only three races.

I sincerely hope you can make this up to me and I look forward to hearing your proposed resolution.

And their response was to blame me, the customer ... to take zero responsibility.

I was angry enough about the suit fail. I am livid about their customer service response.

To paraphrase (a bit) and quote the great Dr. Smith, "Arena, we are never, ever, ever getting back together again."

** Which is hardly a scientific study, but feel matters emotionally and I felt faster in the Arena suit.