Nike ripped for overly revealing U.S. Olympic track outfits: ‘My hoo haa is gonna be out’

Article content

Most Olympic athletes are hoping to put on a show when competing on the biggest stage of their lives.

Nike’s uniforms for the Team USA’s track and field would make for completely different type of show, though.

The sportswear giant was slammed for the overly revealing, hip-baring outfit for female competitors and has some Olympians wondering if they’ll be flashing their genitals to the world.

“Wait, my hoo haa is gonna be out,” long jump hopeful Tara Davis-Woodhall replied to a post on X (formerly Twitter).

Nike was accused of sexism after the rather revealing reveal of the uniforms last week with many commenters wondering if the company took any input at all from female athletes.

“There’s no way a female runner had any say in that design,” one commenter wrote. “I hope USALF is paying for the bikini waxes.”

Another commenter noted that perhaps the people at Nike should have paid more attention in anatomy class.

“If the labia are hanging out on a still mannequin, what do we expect to happen to a moving person?” one commenter wondered.

“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,” Lauren Fleshman, a retired U.S. champion runner posted on Instagram about the outfit.

Fleshman also brought up one truly salient point: “If this outfit was truly beneficial to physical performance, men would wear it.”

While the men’s uniforms are made of the same skintight spandex, their outfits are much more conservative, featuring mid-thigh length shorts and a full-length tank top.

Nike, however, defended the design and insisted that several athletes tested the outfits throughout the process.

“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,” Janett Nichol, vice-president of apparel innovation, said.

Nichol added that the uniforms “perform at the highest level.”

Nike also defended the women’s uniforms by noting that the athletes will have a choice to wear shorts. We think after this debacle, most competitors will take that option.