Allyson Felix - The Nike Break
Know your place and just run!
"I was told to know my place. That runners should just run, that it's just business."- Allyson Felix - U.S. Olympic Athlete and Gold Medalist
When Allyson Felix became pregnant, Nike was prepared to cut the terms of Felix's endorsements by as much as 70% due to the pregnancy and told her as Felix states” to know your place and just run.” SAY WHAT! Is that like “shut up and just dribble”?
Allyson Felix is the most decorated woman in U.S. track and field history. Passing Carl Lewis for the most track and field medals by any American in history. Felix began playing basketball as a kid. She earned the nickname "Chicken Legs" for her lanky physique. To demonstrate her physical strength, the high school freshman went out for the track team. And it was all uphill from there.
Allyson Felix signed her first contract with Nike when she was 18 years old, she had achieved silver in the 200 meters at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, setting a World Junior record over 200m with her impressive time of 22.18 seconds (Damn she was fast). By 2019, Felix after giving birth to her daughter was and in the mist of renegotiating her contract with Nike and would have been 34 years old, she proposed to renegotiate her contract with Nike for maternal protection that would have ensured that she would not be punished if she didn’t perform well doing her first week back.
“I felt pressure to return to form as soon as possible after the birth of my daughter in November 2018, even though I ultimately had to undergo an emergency C-section at 32 weeks because of severe pre-eclampsia that threatened the lives of me and my baby,” Felix wrote in the New York Times.
Nike refused her proposal and offered Felix a 70 percent pay cut. Dissatisfied with the offer, Felix broke ties with Nike in 2019 and broke her non-disclosure agreement to tell her story.
Some of you are saying what? Really! Nike. WOW!
The Track:
Felix is a five-time recipient of the Jesse Owens/Jackie Joyner Kersee Award, an accolade given by USA Track & Field to commend the chosen athlete of the year. She won the award for the first time in 2005, and then again in 2007, 2010, 2012 and 2015. In 2016 Felix continued to make history. At that year’s Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, she became the first female track and field athlete to earn six career Olympic gold medals. Felix also took the silver in the 400 meters. Leaving Rio with a total of nine career Olympic medals. In 2017 Felix won three medals at the world championships in London, 2 golds and a bronze totaling to 16 medals and making her the most decorated athlete (male or female) in the history of the world championships.
The Pregnancy:
In 2018 Felix became pregnant with her first child. During her 32nd-week pregnancy checkup, doctors discovered that Felix had developed pre-eclampsia, a condition that is disproportionately prevalent in African-American women and is marked by high blood pressure along with potentially harmful childbirth effects
Pre-eclampsia is a multi-system disorder specific to pregnancy, characterized by the onset of high blood pressure and often a significant amount of protein in the urine. Pre-eclampsia increases the risk of undesirable as well as lethal outcomes for both the mother and the fetus including preterm labor. If left untreated, it may result in seizures at which point it is known as eclampsia.
Felix was forced to have an emergency c-section seven months into her pregnancy due to this potentially life-threatening condition and in November 2018 she gave birth to her daughter, Camryn, who was delivered by emergency cesarean section. Camryn had to live for more than a month in the NICU.
The Break:
Like other athletes of her caliber, Allyson Felix's income mainly consists of endorsement deals with large companies like Nike. In 2017, as Felix's contract with Nike was set to expire while trying to secure maternity protections with the company in her contract that were ultimately denied, she was asked to participate in an ad about female empowerment. "I was like, this is just beyond disrespectful and tone-deaf” - Felix told NYTimes.
"Nike sometimes, they feel like you don't have another option. So, they can get away with stuff like that because, where are you going to go? And I think that's how I was always perceived: 'She's never going to say anything. She's never going to speak out.'" - Allyson Felix
The most decorated female track athlete in the country was engaged in tense negotiations with Nike, a company she thought aligned with her own core values, only to realize she and other female athletes were only profitable when choosing not to start a family.
Nikes statement to Time: “We regularly have conversations with our athletes about the many initiatives we run around the world. Nike has supported thousands of female athletes for decades. We have learned and grown in how to best support our female athletes.”
In 2019 she testified at a U.S. House Ways and Means Committee hearing that focused on racial disparities in maternal mortality rates in the country. On the topic of the black maternal mortality crisis: "Research shows that racial bias in our maternal health care system includes things like providers spending less time with Black mothers, underestimating the pain of their Black patients, ignoring symptoms and dismissing complaints”. Felix described her experience of giving birth and said that her testimony was part of an effort to raise awareness of the disproportionate risks that African American women face during pregnancy. Nike was called in front of Congress and has since changed their maternity policy vis a vis sponsorship of female athletes. Although the company would eventually compromise in August 2019 by agreeing to not enact performance pay reductions for a year following childbirth."
Felix said,
"I’ve been one of Nike’s most widely marketed athletes. If I can’t secure maternity protection, who can?"
Allyson Felix new brand - SAYSH
Felix dropped Nike and created her own brand of running shoes, the Saysh One. The women who designed and engineered her company’s first shoe were all former employees of Nike. Felix partnered with her brother and business partner Wes and another founder, Darren Breedveld. Together they raised $3 million in seed money to get things started.
She ran in the Olympics, in Japan wearing them under the banner “I Know My Place”.
Allyson Felix was 18 years old when first sponsored by Nike. I am sure they talked about having her best interest at heart. I am sure they convinced her parents that they would be there for her, etc., etc., etc., But when dollars came to doves. Felix health, family protection and livelyness were not in the Nike plan.
Yet in the end
"Nike has joined in officially and contractually providing maternal protection to the female athletes they sponsor. This means that female athletes will no longer be financially penalized for having a child." - Felix
In a statement Nike said: "Female athletes and their representatives will begin receiving written confirmation reaffirming Nike's official pregnancy policy for elite athletes.
Well good on you Nike. I am however, bothered by the term Elite Athletes, and you should be too.
CellyBlue - I Do Know This!
And uteruses for the win! That is disgusting Nike!🤬
The next time I need gym shoes, I’ll be looking for her brand for sure.