Cyclist-designer Angie Ariza caused a riot in the cycling world this week, with her design for a Colombian women’s cycling team outfit being spread virally around the internet.
The team, IDRD-Bogota Humana-San Mateo-Solgar, appear to be wearing flesh-coloured lycra around their pelvic area, making the riders look naked from the waist down.
President of the International Cycling Federation (UCI) Brian Cookson took to social media to respond to the viral source.
“To the many who have raised the issue of a certain women’s team kit, we are on the case. It is unacceptable by any standard of decency,” Cookson wrote Sunday on Twitter.
Certainly, the kit has stirred a lot of pots in a lot of different kitchens around the world, predictably spurring anyone with an interest in women’s cycling to defend the cause and denounce the outfit as a ‘joke’, including champion cyclist Nicole Cooke.
“Girls stand up for yourselves – say no,” she stated, clearly of the opinion that the maillot brings the whole of women’s cycling into disrepute.
Others still used the unfortunate incident as a platform to champion equal pay for female cyclists.
Cycling blog Chasing Wheels made the point, ‘So you can be outraged by an unflattering photo.’
‘Or you can be outraged by the fact that the people running the sport still haven’t bought forward meaningful change to ensure that women are not on the end of enduring sexism in the sport where their right to a fair wage for a professional job is still considered less important than the design of their kit.’
Far be it from me to start an argument about equal pay for male and female athletes, but I believe that while Chasing Wheels makes a very good point, they have used one issue to bring up a relevant-but-unrelated second issue.
Also in the same article, Chasing Wheels acknowledges the fact that the uniforms are not flesh-coloured around the pelvis, they’re not nude-coloured below the waist. They’re gold.
Gold lycra does not photograph well, surprise surprise. Another element in the unfortunate incident is the placement of the padding in pelvic area. It does look bad, I think we can all agree. But to call it ‘unacceptable’, or ‘a joke’, or to call girls to action, is a little overdone.
Can’t we all just agree that the photo is a bit funny, and move on? Do we really need to get on our soapboxes and call down the fire of Heaven on the designer?
I understand the concern that it will make males devalue women’s cycling, or even women’s sport in general. But here’s the thing. I’m a male, and the photo made me laugh.
It didn’t make me devalue the sport.
It certainly didn’t make me disrespect women.
I scrolled down my Facebook feed, gave a start when I saw the photo, looked closer, had a giggle, and scrolled on past. I’m not at all surprised at the furore surrounding it, but I think it needs to be put in context, which is:
A (poorly thought out) uniform design which has been in use for nine months has been photographed in an unflattering light, making the cyclist wearing said uniform appear naked below the waist.
That’s it.
It’s not a deliberate attempt to bring about the sexualisation of women athletes, or an outworking of the chauvinist ideology which unfortunately does filter down through a lot of women’s sport.
Please, just have a laugh if you want, and move on. I can guarantee the rest of the internet community will as soon as the next celebrity nude scandal is birthed.
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