On Thursday, April 11, 2024, Nike unveiled the new designs for Team USA Track and Field uniforms. The women’s kit is revealing and could almost be mistaken for a swimsuit. The backlash was almost immediate.
Many on social media shared their outrage. Even professional athletes entered the chat. Some of them are Olympic hopefuls themselves. Former professional runner Lauren Fleshman dedicated a whole Instagram post to the subject.
The women’s uniform features a high-cut bikini bottom.
This caused one user on X to ask: “this is for the swimming events, right?”
This user was not the only concerned party.
“When will men stop sexualizing women and let female athletes wear shorts like the men do,” pondered another user.
“Apart from being obviously problematic, this is also really ugly,” another user chimed in.
Professional athletes were also disappointed in the design. Olympic hopeful Tara Davis-Woodhall competes in the long jump. Her reaction was one of horror. “Wait, my hoo haa is gonna be out,” she stated on Instagram.
Former Olympian Colleen Quigley commented: “I mean I still wanna make the team but…. .”
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Lauren Fleshman, a former Nike athlete and world champion runner, had harsh words for her ex-sponsor. “I’m sorry, but show me one WNBA or NWSL team who would enthusiastically support this kit. This is for Olympic Track and Field. Professional athletes should be able to compete without dedicating brain space to constant pube vigilance or the mental gymnastics of having every vulnerable piece of your body on display,” she argued in an Instagram post. “Women’s kits should be in service to performance, mentally and physically. If this outfit was truly beneficial to physical performance, men would wear it.”
“This is not an elite athletic kit for track and field,” she went on to say. “This is a costume born of patriarchal forces that are no longer welcome or needed to get eyes on women’s sports. … Stop making it harder for half the population @nike @teamusa @usatf.”
Nike has yet to officially comment on the backlash. Janett Nichol, vice president of apparel innovation at Nike, did speak to CBS Sports about how the designs were tested on athletes. "On the apparel side, why it's a game-changer for us, is because we've now been able to take athlete insights, along with data and use that algorithm to create something that allows us to get to a level of specificity, fidelity and accuracy that we've never been able to do before," she bragged. Time will tell what the future holds for these designs.
