Allyson Felix makes her feelings known on Nike launching maternity line after she left the brand over 'disrespectful' treatment during pregnancy

Allyson Felix shared her feelings over Nike launching a maternity line and celebrating mothers after she left the brand in 2018. The seven-time Olympic champion underwent a life-threatening emergency C-section to give birth to her daughter Camryn before breaking Usain Bolt's gold medal record at the World Championships the following year.

Felix was planning to start a family in 2018 and when her contract with Nike expired in 2017, she asked the company to support maternity protections. However, the 39-year-old said the company refused and offered her a new contract with a 70% pay cut.

She eventually left Nike and later made the details of their split public in 2019, causing a public outcry against the shoewear brand. Nike eventually changed its policy and also launched a maternity line in 2020 but for Felix, "it's a hard pill to swallow".

Speaking during an appearance on the Spring Hill podcast, the 14-time World Champion said about Nike's change in policy towards female athletes:

"Yeah, it's been a hard pill to swallow like watching them launch their maternity line, watching celebrate mothers like to me that's very hard to see with what I dealt with internally because it was a fight to be able to change this." [12:30 onwards]

However, Felix acknowledged it was important for her to face what she faced to bring the change and held no 'huge animosity' towards the brand now.

"I don't have huge animosity because I feel like I'm where I'm supposed to be, like everything happened and it brought me to what I'm supposed to be doing," Allyson Felix added.

Following the birth of her now six-year-old daughter Camryn, the eleven-time Olympic medalist signed with Athleta in 2019 and scripted a historic comeback at the World Championships that year. Felix won gold medals in the mixed 4x400m relay and women's 4x400m relay to surpass Usain Bolt for the most World titles in history.

Felix also launched her own women's focused footwear company, Saysh, in 2021 and a women's sports management firm, Always Alpha, in 2024.

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"I was like, this is just beyond disrespectful and tone-deaf" - Allyson Felix on being asked to participate in a female-empowerment ad for Nike

Paris 2024 Olympic Games - Allyson Felix in attendance (Source: Getty)

When Allyson Felix was negotiating maternity protections with Nike in 2018, she said she was asked to feature in an ad campaign celebrating female empowerment for the company. Her reaction was, "my stomach dropped".

"My stomach dropped. I was like, this is just beyond disrespectful and tone-deaf," Allyson Felix told Time ahead of the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.

It also became the moment she decided to speak out, later writing an op-ed in the New York Times that would spark a series of changes in Nike's policies. She won a gold and a bronze medal at the Tokyo Olympics before retiring with an exact pair of medals at the 2022 World Championships in Eugene, USA.