Pool swim vs open water swim w/ wetsuit

Pool

Open water with wetsuit.

A number of factors here including 1)  How hard do you push off the wall in the pool, no push, flip turns, open turns, etc 2) Current in the OW 3) How straight you swim in OW.

For me I don't do flip turns, I do some version of an open turn in the pool but I don't push very hard so I lose a few seconds every lap in the pool.  If the current in the OW isn't too bad and my siting is good I'm faster in the OW with a wetsuit.  If not, then they work out to be about the same.

My experience is that they end up being almost equal.  There are factors that make each one faster as well as slower.  I think if you could swim in clear, calm, still, flat open water in a wetsuit you could be faster.  But having to navigate through wind chop and current slows you down.

Just one man's experience...

x2...for me without question ows...unless rough seas

For me, OWS regardless of wetsuit or not, because there's no waiting at the walls for the people who claimed they would go 1:20/100 but are actually going 1:50/100.

Yeah, I can tell you I have no idea which one is "faster"

Not only measurements, but conditions, navigation, chop, wind, current, drafting, etc

I have no idea either.

This is where a garmin in the swim cap comes in handy in OWS.

Of course, I can't count laps for anything so I can't tell how fast I go in the pool.

I will say on a short distance I probably go faster in the pool, just because I know I can rest in 2 minutes at the wall.  In the OW I'm holding back a bit till I'm within 100 or so of the shore.

I have a swim from last summer recorded where I swam 800m (measured by a garmin in my cap) in a bay with a wetsuit in 10:25 which is a 1:18/100m pace - my notes from the day say I swam it at "race pace" (whatever that means).  For me, a 1:18 pace in the pool over 800m would probably be pretty darn close to what I could do if I pushed it hard.  So, long story short I think it's about the same for me. 

This weekend I am heading to an outdoor, 50m pool, and I intend to find out the difference between wetsuit (lots of people use their wetsuits in this particular pool), no wetsuit, and the 25 yard pool I regularly swim in.

Not quite a conversion to open water, but it will give some feedback.

My guess is that since I do flip turns, with a moderate push off the wall, I will be fastest in the 25 yard pool, second fastest with a wetsuit in the 50m pool, and slowest in the 50m pool without a wetsuit.