Why Are We Still Policing What Female Athletes Wear?

From too much skin to not enough, champions can’t win

Getty images; illustration by Oana Cazan

Why on Earth does what modern women wear in athletic competition still provoke so much fuss and bluster? Why, at this Olympics in Tokyo, where there is so much else to worry about, are we still policing how much or how little skin women should be showing while they perform astonishing feats of physical prowess that the rest of us could never dream of?

There is a meme going around right now (attributed to Ida Skibenes) that goes: “We live in a world where girls and women are fined for trying to cover up while playing sports but also expelled from school if their shoulders are showing.” It’s funny—and devastating—because it is true.

Take the German gymnastics team, who have made headlines and won hearts the world over by choosing to wear—gasp—full-length unitards to compete, instead of the bare-legged versions sanctioned by the sport, cut high on the thigh. These athletes wanted the same coverage as the male gymnasts, and released a statement saying the new look was a statement against the overt “sexualization” of the sport. Bravo! How anyone could concentrate on flipping in the air with such little butt coverage is a miracle.


Meanwhile, handball made it into the Youth Olympics this year, but the only story that anyone knows about that sport is that the Norwegian beach handball team was fined by the European Handball Federation for choosing to wear (still tiny, still tight) Spandex shorts over the usual bikini bottoms at the European Beach Handball Championships a few weeks ago. Pop star Pink was set to pay the fines for these newly crowned feminist warriors, but in the end, the Norwegian Handball Federation rightfully covered the fines.

Then there is the more subtle, but still important fashion statement made by Sunisa Lee, the all-around gold medal gymnast for the U.S.A. Lee’s lash extensions and long manicured nails felt like a little bit of rebellion in the arena. The uniform presentation of women’s gymnastics sends such complicated messages around femininity that this show of individual style and personal expression felt progressive.

 And that’s just this month. In the past few years, the contentious conversation around female athletes pushing the boundaries of their work wardrobes—while simultaneously demanding to be taken seriously—has come to a head.

In August of 2018, for instance, the pre-eminent female athlete of our time delivered the chicest, slyest, most bang-on middle finger to sartorial censorship. Serena Williams wore a tutu—not just any tutu but a one-armed tutu designed by the breathtakingly cool Virgil Abloh for Nike—at the U.S. Open, one week after being admonished by French Open officials for wearing a sleek black catsuit. The official line from French Tennis Federation president Bernard Giudicelli: “I believe we have sometimes gone too far. Serena’s outfit this year, for example, would no longer be accepted. You have to respect the game and the place.”

Clothing censorship is nothing new, especially for female athletes. In the late 19th century, when women first began to push to be allowed to participate in sports, they were forced to wear billowing and figure-obscuring full-body gear of the Victorian era. In 1914, the Olympic committee decreed women could compete only in sports in which they could wear long skirts. That meant tennis, croquet and golf, but also, somehow, baseball and ice skating. Can you imagine running for home base in a voluminous, full-length skirt?

Seventies tennis superstar Billie Jean King was thought of as scandalous at the time for wearing sleeveless tops and short skirts

There have also always been pioneers brave enough to break the rules. Take French tennis player Suzanne Lenglen, who debuted a knee-length white skirt on the courts in 1910. We wonder if she had to pass smelling salts into the spectator stands. Sonja Henie, the Norwegian figure skater, broke down performance barriers by chopping off her skirt to the knees in the 1920s, so she could twirl and jump like the guys. Then, in 1949, an American named Gussie Moran asked to wear a coloured outfit to compete at Wimbledon. She was turned down, so instead she showed up in a thigh-high skirt, pre-dating the Mary Quant miniskirt era by 17 years.

Seventies tennis superstar Billie Jean King (whose inspiring story was recently told in a biopic starring Emma Stone) was thought of as scandalous at the time for wearing sleeveless tops and short skirts. And for her famous (victorious) Battle of the Sexes match against self-proclaimed “chauvinist” Bobby Riggs, King wore a short-sleeved, very short dress spangled with rhinestones that now resides in 
the Smithsonian.

In 1985, American tennis player Anne White foreshadowed the Williams drama by wearing a white catsuit to Wimbledon, complying with the “all white” rule but thumbing her nose at the skirt tradition. She was called out by her opponent, Pam Shriver, who claimed to find the suit distracting; it was subsequently banned.

Katarina Witt, the German Olympic champion figure skater (she won 10 golds between 1984 and 1988) was known for her ability to hoist her ankle above her head and spin like a top. But she is legend for the sublime way she struck down censure for what was deemed her “indecent costume,” a blue spangled bodysuit that plunged low in the front and was held up with thin straps at the back. She simply told judges that the music she was skating to demanded that outfit. Cool as a cucumber.

But it’s Florence Griffith Joyner, the brilliant sprinter who won gold in both the 100 and 200 metre races at the 1988 summer Olympics, who went furthest with using fashion as self-expression in athletic competition—and to whom Sha’Carri Richardson, the star American runner who was pulled from Olympic eligibility due to cannabis found in a drug test, has been compared for her own exuberant styling.

Growing up in Los Angeles, Griffith Joyner designed her own one-legged, Day-Glo running outfits, and continued to wear them as she shattered records. She wore her hair long and loose, and it whipped behind her in the wind. Most notably, she defied the proscription against long nails (said to hamper the starting block process) and maintained talons decorated with elaborate nail art. Her style garnered mocking press coverage tinged with racism, but Griffith Joyner, who died tragically young of a seizure at age 38, left an enduring legacy. On Halloween 2018, Beyoncé paid tribute to Flo-Jo by dressing up in her famous purple, one-legged bodysuit. 

In 2017, golfer Alexis Thompson, known for her colourful outfits, protested new LPGA dress codes—which banned “plunging necklines” and shorts or skirts short enough to show “the bottom area”—in the most contemporary way. She posted a photo to Instagram of herself wearing a golf outfit from the early 1900s—a blouse, long skirt and fitted jacket that would severely restrict a swing.

These trailblazers show that there is no disconnect between expressing yourself through your clothing and being awesomely strong and powerful. Williams called the catsuit her Black Panther suit, referring to the smash-hit movie, saying it “made her feel like a superhero.” 

The thing that really rankles about the catsuit hoo-ha is that the outfit was actually a compression garment designed to prevent blood clots, to which Williams has been vulnerable since developing a circulation condition after the birth of her daughter in 2017. Motherhood has often hampered women’s careers—of any kind, let alone in ultra-elite athletics. If it weren’t enough of an uphill climb for Williams to return to the top post-baby, now decorum is getting in the way of protecting her health. In interviews, Williams was nothing but gracious about the controversy. A true champion. 

One clothing item common to almost all women athletes is sports bras, a particularly loaded subject. Last August at the U.S. Open, French tennis player Alizé Cornet noticed her top was on backwards. She flipped her shirt around, exposing her sports bra. This drew a code violation from the umpire (though no male players received penalties for removing their shirts to cool off between points). After much outcry, the decision was reversed. 

The sports bra squeamishness was also felt last year at Rowan University in New Jersey, when students complained about the school policy banning girls from wearing sports bras as tops during practices and games. After the protest, the administration backed down to allow sports bras to be worn alone during practices.

Until 2012, women volleyball players were banned from wearing anything other than bikinis or one-piece swimsuits

Sometimes, showing a little midriff is welcomed, not censured. Russian tennis player Anna Kournikova introduced crop tops to the pro tour circa 2002, but she wasn’t criticized for her truncated two-piece outfit by male officials—perhaps because they were too busy ogling her. Fitting a slim, blonde-haired, blue-eyed standard of beauty, Kournikova was able to milk the attention and dominate the business side of the game, hauling in gold-standard endorsements and magazine covers even though she never won a singles title. 

When it comes to showing skin, we’re generally damned if we do and damned if we don’t. Take the ludicrous case of beach volleyball. Today, the athletes can wear warmer gear to suit colder weather conditions, but until 2012, women players were banned from wearing anything other than bikinis or one-piece swimsuits—presumably to protect the TV ratings boost from showing chicks in bikinis diving around in the sand. 

Of course, sports clothing is about much more than aesthetics. Good uniform technology is proven to improve performance, from diving and swimming to running and tennis. When the Lululemon team was designing the uniforms for Canada’s beach volleyball teams for the 2016 Olympics, it used its high-tech British Columbia “Whitespace” lab to make sure the garments were shaped optimally for movement—and ensure there were no wardrobe malfunctions—by fitting the athletes with 3-D scanning technology.

Competitive athletes need to wear apparel that helps them perform at their personal peak, but active females of all skill levels have shared clothing desires: We want to move freely. We don’t want to be sexualized or reduced to our body parts, or told that drawing attention to our femininity is unseemly or provocative. We don’t want to be too hot or too cold. 

Beyond those basic needs, we want to dress in a way that helps us feel confident enough to run fast or hit hard, and expresses our personality while we’re doing it. Is that really too much to ask in 2021? To move in peace—or to watch this Olympics and actually be able to concentrate on the sports. 


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