Speaker 1: In the game of life, Maintaining a healthy lifestyle and
Speaker 1: nurturing meaningful connections with family can be among the most
Speaker 1: formidable challenges we face.
Speaker 2: I tried to do simple things in my body wasn't responding,
Speaker 2: and so that's really when I start to question, can
Speaker 2: I get back to me yet?
Speaker 1: For many professional athletes, fostering both has proven to be
Speaker 1: a triumphant recipe for success.
Speaker 3: There was something that I told her that I haven't
Speaker 3: delivered on yet, but I still will is I will
Speaker 3: make sure you are the highest paid female athlete in sports.
Speaker 1: I'm John Frankel. For the past two decades, I've traveled
Speaker 1: the globe covering some of the most impactful human interest
Speaker 1: stories in sports. On this show, I'm sitting down with
Speaker 1: some of the biggest families in the game, the legends,
Speaker 1: current superstars, and the up and coming playmakers to understand
Speaker 1: what's really making them tick. What can pro athlete families
Speaker 1: teach a new generation about the importance of caring for
Speaker 1: your health and finding success in the face of adversity. Together,
Speaker 1: we'll hear stories of their remarkable comebacks, setbacks, and the
Speaker 1: crucial role their family and self care played in their paths.
Speaker 1: To championship glory.
Speaker 4: This is part of the game.
Speaker 1: In the pantheon of US track and field superstars, Alison
Speaker 1: Felix stands alone. Over the course of five consecutive Olympic Games,
Speaker 1: Felix collected eleven medals, including one bronze, three silver, and
Speaker 1: seven gold. Felix also dominated the World Championships in track
Speaker 1: and field, winning more medals in those competitions than anyone else. Ever,
Speaker 1: her success on the track has given her a platform
Speaker 1: to push for change for female athletes. For example, in
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen, she spoke out publicly against her then sponsored
Speaker 1: Nike for not providing guaranteed financial protections for pregnant athletes
Speaker 1: and new moms.
Speaker 2: They were asking me to tell women and girls that
Speaker 2: they could do anything, and when we're having this like
Speaker 2: internal battle. So that was a moment where I was like,
Speaker 2: you know, we've got to speak on this.
Speaker 3: We were on the same page, but we were also
Speaker 3: both really terrified. I think if she would have said no,
Speaker 3: I don't want to do it, I think I would
Speaker 3: have been like, Okay, no, I understand, but I'm so
Speaker 3: glad she was willing to do it.
Speaker 1: Going public with her concerns Felix sparked a firestorm of
Speaker 1: controversy and turn the spotlight on pregnancy discrimination. Just under
Speaker 1: three weeks, it pushed the sportswear giant to change its
Speaker 1: contract terms for female athletes, but the track star and
Speaker 1: Nike would part ways, and as the sun was setting
Speaker 1: on her athletic career, Felix would have one last race
Speaker 1: to run. At the twenty twenty Tokyo Olympics. She would
Speaker 1: end her historic career by winning the bronze medal in
Speaker 1: the four hundred meters and helping Team USA win the.
Speaker 4: Gold in the four by four hundred.
Speaker 1: Meter relays that helped to overtake Carl Lewis to become
Speaker 1: the most decorated American Olympic track and field athlete of
Speaker 1: all time, and she did it wearing sneakers from her
Speaker 1: own brand, Sash. The risky move came about after she
Speaker 1: split from Nike, and her older brother, an agent, Wes Felix,
Speaker 1: had encouraged her to take control of her career. The
Speaker 1: end of her competitive career marked the beginning of a
Speaker 1: fresh start, working together with her brother. Alison Felix is
Speaker 1: now part activist and entrepreneur with a goal of making sure,
Speaker 1: mom athletes get a fair shake. Thank you, guys, I
Speaker 1: appreciate it. Thanks for joining us. Let's go back to
Speaker 1: the beginning here, Allison, was track always your first love?
Speaker 5: I wouldn't say it was. I kind of stumbled into it.
Speaker 2: I loved basketball, that was like my thing, and Wes
Speaker 2: is two years older than me, so whatever he was doing,
Speaker 2: I was kind of trying to keep up. But it
Speaker 2: was very apparent quickly that basketball was not my gift.
Speaker 2: So kept searching and eventually found track.
Speaker 1: What was the appeal about track? Where did it kick
Speaker 1: in for you?
Speaker 6: No?
Speaker 1: Pun intended that you found this spark.
Speaker 2: Well, I'm a competitive person, you know, we come from
Speaker 2: a competitive family, and I just love the idea that,
Speaker 2: like on that day, you could figure out right away,
Speaker 2: like who was the fastest, nothing subjective about it, And
Speaker 2: that just really appealed to me.
Speaker 5: And I always loved racing the.
Speaker 2: Boys and kind of all that stuff, so it was
Speaker 2: the perfect thing for me.
Speaker 1: Speaking of racing boys, when was the first time you
Speaker 1: two matched up on a track?
Speaker 5: I think we ever matched up on a track?
Speaker 4: Like?
Speaker 1: Or was it more informal than that?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's an even better story here, John, that is
Speaker 3: when was the first time Allison beat me. We would
Speaker 3: train a lot when we were both competing, and we
Speaker 3: got to get like good workouts in together. But at
Speaker 3: the end of each season, we'd go on a vacation
Speaker 3: and we would do a brother sister race. And you know,
Speaker 3: it started when we were both competing, so I think
Speaker 3: like my opportunity to win was pretty high.
Speaker 4: I would have like put your money on me. As
Speaker 4: time went on, I think.
Speaker 3: Allison started to become the favorite and the distance would
Speaker 3: get shorter, which would give me a chance to hold
Speaker 3: on a little bit longer. And then it was twenty
Speaker 3: twenty one, coming right off of Tokyo Olympics.
Speaker 4: We're on the beach and we run.
Speaker 3: She gets out ahead of me, which kind of expecting
Speaker 3: she just came back from the Olympics and I was
Speaker 3: far far from that, but I just knew I was
Speaker 3: going to catch her.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: I'm just like looking out in front and I'm like, oh,
Speaker 3: it's just a matter of just nope, I'm about to
Speaker 3: make my move.
Speaker 4: And then I'm like, wait, the move's not happening.
Speaker 3: And we start getting towards the finish line and realize
Speaker 3: this isn't happening. She's she's going to beat me, She's
Speaker 3: going to beat me for real.
Speaker 4: I didn't let her win.
Speaker 3: She beat me, and so there's a new person who's
Speaker 3: been thrown fastest in the family, in the Felix household.
Speaker 1: Alison, do you remember for real the first time that
Speaker 1: you were able to catch your older brother and gave
Speaker 1: you this realization that you were really, really good?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 5: I think that was the beauty of it.
Speaker 2: I never won, you know, he ran track, and that
Speaker 2: literally was the first time I ever won. So I
Speaker 2: think that like made me where I wasn't scared to lose,
Speaker 2: and also where I was just like eager for the
Speaker 2: next challenge because in my own family, my dad and
Speaker 2: my brother like you know, super competitive, and I literally
Speaker 2: could not beat them. I mean he was, you know,
Speaker 2: a great athlete. But yeah, it didn't phaze me. I
Speaker 2: think I never expected that I would win every race.
Speaker 1: Did you have the bond before you both noticed that
Speaker 1: track was your passion or did your competitiveness and your
Speaker 1: participation in track create the bond that you have today.
Speaker 5: I would say that we had the bond before.
Speaker 2: I mean I think we had a very normal kind
Speaker 2: of like fighting growing up like very typical brother sister,
Speaker 2: and I think for me, I remember like somewhere around
Speaker 2: like middle school, feeling like we're actually on the same team.
Speaker 2: That was kind of like a turning point.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I would agree. I think the bond really formed
Speaker 3: in middle school. But I think what Track did was
Speaker 3: took it even deeper and solidified it. It started to
Speaker 3: give us real like shared problems almost, you know, and
Speaker 3: the problem being like you get really nervous before a race.
Speaker 3: Sometimes you run well, sometimes you don't run well, and
Speaker 3: how do you deal with disappointment? How do you make
Speaker 3: sure that you're working really hard? You know, all of
Speaker 3: those things. So we really started to have a shared goal.
Speaker 3: That just solidified the bond a whole lot more.
Speaker 1: Given the nature of the bond that you had in
Speaker 1: developing that at a young age, would you have expected
Speaker 1: that you would find yourselves here today working as agent client?
Speaker 1: Was that something you had talked about and envisioned.
Speaker 5: Wes, I feel like you talked about it. Me I
Speaker 5: feel like not so much.
Speaker 2: But I also not totally surprised because even through college,
Speaker 2: you know, starting out was very close. We shared an apartment,
Speaker 2: and so yeah, it doesn't totally surprise me. But I
Speaker 2: feel like, Wes, did you have a master plan?
Speaker 5: I feel like you better.
Speaker 3: I think you know, I don't even know that if
Speaker 3: it was necessarily my master plan. I think it might
Speaker 3: have been our dad. Our dad knew that I was
Speaker 3: really interested in sports management, and you know, when I
Speaker 3: was in high school, I told him like, oh, I
Speaker 3: think I would love to do sports and entertainment law
Speaker 3: after college. I didn't even really know what that meant.
Speaker 3: But then got to college and my second year of college,
Speaker 3: that's when Allison decided that she was going to go pro.
Speaker 3: And as she was going through that initial first deal,
Speaker 3: my dad really brought me along and said, I want
Speaker 3: you to see every part of it. And so I
Speaker 3: went to the meetings. I sat on the calls, I
Speaker 3: took notes, I asked questions. Then when a few years later,
Speaker 3: I said, what if we actually worked together and said,
Speaker 3: that's Alison and we took it to our parents. I
Speaker 3: think I may have thought it was my idea, but
Speaker 3: I think he might have been maneuvering a few things
Speaker 3: behind the scenes along the way.
Speaker 1: Allison, were you receptive right away to this concept?
Speaker 5: It just came at the perfect time for me.
Speaker 2: I was having like some frustrations around like where I was,
Speaker 2: and I felt like I really needed to focus in
Speaker 2: on the track part of things, and I needed to
Speaker 2: be able to trust whoever I was working with to
Speaker 2: do all the other stuff, and so it was just
Speaker 2: kind of like, yeah, the perfect timing for us to
Speaker 2: do this.
Speaker 1: There are times, Wes when an agent tests to tell
Speaker 1: a client to superstar athlete what to do, what not
Speaker 1: to do. Has that been difficult along the way.
Speaker 3: You know, It's really interesting because not so much with Alison,
Speaker 3: it's been okay. I've had been fortunate enough to represent
Speaker 3: a couple of other superstar athletes and it was really
Speaker 3: challenging with them, and I almost, you know, in my head,
Speaker 3: I thought it would have been the flip the reverse,
Speaker 3: thought it would have been much harder to tell Alison
Speaker 3: the hard things, but it wasn't. It was much harder
Speaker 3: to tell some of the other clients the hard things.
Speaker 4: And I think I was.
Speaker 3: Just a little bit more used to her disappointment process,
Speaker 3: her frustration process, and I think I was more used
Speaker 3: to knowing this will just take time. So I knew
Speaker 3: how to kind of let that be and know that
Speaker 3: I could say the hard thing and that she knew
Speaker 3: not only did I love her as a brother, but
Speaker 3: I wanted what was best for her and for her career.
Speaker 3: So it wasn't too too bad, but it was scary
Speaker 3: at times, you know, especially at the beginning, when you
Speaker 3: had to say the thing that you knew she didn't
Speaker 3: want to hear.
Speaker 1: Allison, do you remember a specific example when Wes may
Speaker 1: have told you something and you vehemently disagreed with him,
Speaker 1: and you even tried to do it your way and
Speaker 1: he said, no, just listen to me, trust me on this.
Speaker 2: I feel like the hardest moments were really around when
Speaker 2: I was much older, you know, when I was dealing
Speaker 2: with having a child and with Nike, and I think
Speaker 2: those were kind of some of the hardest moments of
Speaker 2: just communicating a lot of things that I felt like
Speaker 2: very disrespected with. And so it wasn't necessarily that we disagreed,
Speaker 2: but it was he was delivering information that was really
Speaker 2: devastating to me, and so that was probably, I feel
Speaker 2: like the most challenging kind of phase.
Speaker 3: There were times when my advice was we just need
Speaker 3: to sit tight, and I think that that's really hard,
Speaker 3: especially if you're at a point where you're out of contract,
Speaker 3: money's not coming in, You're not sure if money is
Speaker 3: going to come in, and for the advice to.
Speaker 4: Be trust me, sit tight. Here's what we're doing.
Speaker 3: And Allison and I would talk a lot about as
Speaker 3: an individual athlete trying to negotiate a deal with a
Speaker 3: large sports apparel company. You don't have leverage. That company
Speaker 3: doesn't need you. Their business is still going to work
Speaker 3: whether you're there or not. And there are very very
Speaker 3: few athletes that those companies don't survive without.
Speaker 1: Allison Felix won her first international title at just sixteen
Speaker 1: years old. After graduating from high school, she gave up
Speaker 1: her college eligibility and signed an endorsement deal with Adidas.
Speaker 1: Like her big brother, she would attend usc the University
Speaker 1: of Southern California. Adidas picked up the tab for her tuition,
Speaker 1: and Felix would graduate from college with a degree in education,
Speaker 1: and she kept running. In two thousand and four, at
Speaker 1: just eighteen years old, she would begin an historic Olympic
Speaker 1: journey with the US Track and Field team. You compete
Speaker 1: in five consecutive Olympics. Correct, yes, in the two hundred
Speaker 1: meter You win silver in two thousand and four, two
Speaker 1: thousand and eight. It's not until London in twenty twelve
Speaker 1: that you take gold. That seems like a long journey.
Speaker 5: It was a long journey and it was really challenging.
Speaker 2: I think also at those particular ages, you know, like
Speaker 2: my first Olympics, it was it was all good.
Speaker 5: It was new.
Speaker 2: You know, I was eighteen, and I'm so excited and
Speaker 2: I was disappointed getting soilber, but you know, family quickly
Speaker 2: helps me realize, like, you know, this is great. The
Speaker 2: second Olympics, that's when it really hit, you know, when
Speaker 2: everything changed.
Speaker 5: I was the favorite.
Speaker 2: You know, I have sponsors and expectations and responsibilities, and
Speaker 2: I'm navigating still being a young woman and competing professionally
Speaker 2: while being in school and just all these different things.
Speaker 2: And when I got that second silver medal, I was devastated.
Speaker 5: I was embarrassed.
Speaker 2: I just felt like, I'm not sure if this is
Speaker 2: ever really going to come together. And on that stage,
Speaker 2: you know, thinking about committing for another four years with
Speaker 2: no guarantees, that was challenging.
Speaker 1: Given that you had so much success in the Olympics. Overall,
Speaker 1: you won I think eleven medals, seven of them are gold,
Speaker 1: some are individuals, some are team in relays. As the
Speaker 1: games go on, do the goals change or is gold
Speaker 1: always the standard?
Speaker 2: Gold has always been the standard. It's always been very
Speaker 2: clear cut for me, and I think that's partly what
Speaker 2: makes it challenging is that I always measured the success
Speaker 2: like gold or failure. It was after London, I would say,
Speaker 2: when everything came together for me. I won the three
Speaker 2: gold medals and we set a world record, and you know,
Speaker 2: it's everything that I always wanted, and it didn't quite
Speaker 2: measure up to what I thought it was going to feel.
Speaker 2: Like I think I thought everything was going to be different,
Speaker 2: you know, and I've made it, like finally checked that box,
Speaker 2: and I think I had to kind of unpack like
Speaker 2: what that was really about. And I think it was
Speaker 2: the journey and the process and the failures along the
Speaker 2: way that was a turning point for me where I
Speaker 2: think I started to measure the success differently, like I
Speaker 2: could find bright spots even when everything didn't go perfectly right.
Speaker 2: And that's also I think where the point of my
Speaker 2: career where I found more purpose and like trying to
Speaker 2: create some impact, and it just became a little bit
Speaker 2: bigger than just a.
Speaker 5: Sport for me.
Speaker 1: At the twenty thirteen World Championships in Moscow, Felix was
Speaker 1: trying to make history to win a fourth consecutive gold
Speaker 1: at the event. Instead, she endured a devastating injury. You
Speaker 1: talk about having to wait four years, all the training
Speaker 1: that goes into something the disappointment twenty thirteen, You were
Speaker 1: trying to become the first to take four gold medals
Speaker 1: in the same event at the World Championships. You want
Speaker 1: to take it from there or do you want me
Speaker 1: to lay it out? The gun goes off your fifty
Speaker 1: meters or so into the race, into the turn, and
Speaker 1: what happens.
Speaker 2: I fell, just a popping in my hamstring. I think
Speaker 2: that was probably my first major injury. I crumbled to
Speaker 2: the track and I remember just kind of looking up
Speaker 2: and seeing the race happen without me before I even
Speaker 2: got to the track or out there. You know, my
Speaker 2: coach was saying, like, I think something special is going
Speaker 2: to happen, Like I felt t to like do something
Speaker 2: really great, and so to come falling to the.
Speaker 5: Track and Howison Felix has fallen.
Speaker 2: That was not something I was familiar with at all,
Speaker 2: and it was Yeah, it was a tough moment.
Speaker 1: Take me into the mind of an elite athlete while
Speaker 1: you're sitting there on the track for that time, you're bummed,
Speaker 1: maybe angry, but can you really allow yourself to express
Speaker 1: your emotions because you know the cameras are on you.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I think in that moment, I was definitely showing the emotion.
Speaker 2: And I remember there's this moment like you get hurt
Speaker 2: on the track, and my thing is like, how how
Speaker 2: do you get off? Like I've never been in this
Speaker 2: position before, Like how am I going to get out
Speaker 2: of here? And I am in Russia and there's a
Speaker 2: language barrier with the people who come running over to me.
Speaker 2: They bring like a stretcher and they can't figure out
Speaker 2: how to get it up. And I remember just being like,
Speaker 2: I just want to get off of here. And the
Speaker 2: next time I lifted my head. Somehow Wes managed to
Speaker 2: get down on the track.
Speaker 5: And out of nowhere. I'm like, how did you do this?
Speaker 2: But he literally just picked me up and carried me
Speaker 2: off the track, And I think that symbolizes our relationship.
Speaker 5: It's just like, you know he's there when I need him.
Speaker 2: But that was a really yeah, the first really big injury,
Speaker 2: and we kind of went through it together.
Speaker 7: That's her brother Wes and her training partner Jennifer Tarmal,
Speaker 7: who are taking her off the track. She will not
Speaker 7: leave here in a stretcher. She leave instead in the
Speaker 7: arms of her brother Wes.
Speaker 1: What do you remember, what was your initial thought and
Speaker 1: how did you get to the stretcher to lift your
Speaker 1: sister up?
Speaker 3: You know, I remember just Alison being on the cusp
Speaker 3: of history with this fourth consecutive world championship. So I'm
Speaker 3: sitting there with my parents in the stands, and she
Speaker 3: got a good start, which that doesn't happen all the time,
Speaker 3: which I think, you know, maybe also led to the
Speaker 3: injury of how much force she was really putting on.
Speaker 3: And there were a couple steps before the actual injury
Speaker 3: where you could just see something was off and so
Speaker 3: noticing that, my dad and I kind of looked at
Speaker 3: each other and then before we know it, she's down
Speaker 3: on the track. And so in that moment, it wasn't
Speaker 3: an agent, It was a brother who knew that not
Speaker 3: so much. Even Oh, she's going to be so disappointed,
Speaker 3: but she's hurt, you know, and how do I get
Speaker 3: to her because she's hurt. But I remember looking at
Speaker 3: my dad, and I said I'll go down there, and
Speaker 3: he just said okay. And I think there was something
Speaker 3: in the way he said okay, that didn't make it
Speaker 3: sound crazy. So I get down to the security guard
Speaker 3: and it's as Alison mentioned in Russia, and really I
Speaker 3: just said to him somehow in a way that he understood,
Speaker 3: probably in the like pain in my face, you know,
Speaker 3: that's my sister. I have to get to her. And
Speaker 3: it was pretty easy. He just moved to the side
Speaker 3: and I hopped over the railing and jumped down there.
Speaker 3: And once I was on the track, I think they
Speaker 3: knew me enough that I wasn't, you know, or something,
Speaker 3: so they let me be there. And I could see
Speaker 3: in Allison's face just this deep, deep hurt. This was
Speaker 3: a moment she just wanted to hide and she needed
Speaker 3: to process the feelings and emotions on her own, you know.
Speaker 3: And they're trying to get her off the track and
Speaker 3: it's not working. And so I asked her, you know,
Speaker 3: do you want me to pick you up? And she
Speaker 3: said yes and then carried her off.
Speaker 1: When we return. Alison Felix on calling out pregnancy discrimination
Speaker 1: and how it led to perhaps her greatest victory.
Speaker 2: I remember I was in my daughter's nursery, she was
Speaker 2: born two months early, and Wes calls me and he
Speaker 2: is saying that Nike is requesting to use my image
Speaker 2: in a Women's World Cup campaign. They were asking me
Speaker 2: to tell women and girls that they could do anything.
Speaker 2: When we're having this like internal back, that was a
Speaker 2: moment where I was like, you know, we've got to
Speaker 2: speak on this.
Speaker 1: Part of the game.
Speaker 4: We'll be right back.
Speaker 1: And now back to part of the game, we should
Speaker 1: take a moment to ask about your daughter, who's now
Speaker 1: five emergency C section premature.
Speaker 2: She doing okay, Yeah, she's thriving now and she's doing
Speaker 2: so well and can't even believe the journey that we've
Speaker 2: come from. But yeah, she's doing great. Thanks for asking.
Speaker 1: Alison. You gave birth to your daughter in twenty eighteen,
Speaker 1: and the following year you write an op ed in
Speaker 1: The New York Times the challenge Nike, who was your
Speaker 1: sponsor at the time, over the contract terms. They were
Speaker 1: reportedly asking you to take a significant pay cut, right
Speaker 1: almost seventy percent of your salary and not guaranteeing that
Speaker 1: you wouldn't get fired if you didn't live up to
Speaker 1: their performance marks. Is that right? Did I sum that
Speaker 1: up pretty well?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 5: I think that's a good summary. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Were you reluctant at all to go public with this?
Speaker 5: I was terrified.
Speaker 2: I mean it's just so outside of who I was
Speaker 2: as an athlete, Like for the majority of my career,
Speaker 2: I barely said anything, you know, head down, did the
Speaker 2: work stayed in my lane. I was very i think
Speaker 2: scared to have like strong opinions on anything and really
Speaker 2: just like fought to fit this like perfect image. So
Speaker 2: this was like when my world just like turned upside down.
Speaker 2: So I was really really scared.
Speaker 1: Tell me, what was the tipping point for you in
Speaker 1: this Where did it hit you in the gut that
Speaker 1: you said, that's it, I have to speak up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was this very specific moment. I mean, all
Speaker 2: of this had been going on. The money was the money,
Speaker 2: and we had really moved off of that. It was
Speaker 2: asking for the maternal protections, which meant a time period
Speaker 2: to recover from having birth and to be able to
Speaker 2: get back to top form to not receive a reduction
Speaker 2: which would be standard in the contract.
Speaker 5: And so that was the major point.
Speaker 2: And they had told me that I could have the time,
Speaker 2: but they weren't willing in the contract to legally tie
Speaker 2: it to maternity or pregnancy so that it didn't set
Speaker 2: the precedent for all their female athletes. So that was
Speaker 2: the point where we weren't landing in the same place.
Speaker 2: And I remember I had been home for a little
Speaker 2: bit and I was in my daughter's nursery. I had
Speaker 2: a very traumatic birth experience with her. She was born
Speaker 2: two months early, She's been a month in the NICU,
Speaker 2: and I'm in her nursery and Wes calls me and
Speaker 2: he is saying that, you know, Nike is requesting to
Speaker 2: use my image in a Women's World Cup campaign. And
Speaker 2: that was like the final thing because we're still at
Speaker 2: this point, we're still going back and forth, you know,
Speaker 2: fighting over these maternal protections, like it's all happening right then,
Speaker 2: and that final request was just like such a miss
Speaker 2: to me. It was like they didn't see what was happening.
Speaker 2: They were asking me to tell women and girls that
Speaker 2: they could do anything, and when we're having this like
Speaker 2: internal battle. So that was a moment where I was like,
Speaker 2: you know, we've got to speak on this.
Speaker 1: You felt they were being somewhat duplicitous in.
Speaker 5: This yeah, I did.
Speaker 2: I couldn't put my face out there and stand for
Speaker 2: that when I felt like we're going through this whole
Speaker 2: thing kind of behind the curtain.
Speaker 1: Wes as manager and brother, I'm guessing you were torn
Speaker 1: somewhat emotionally. You could understand what Alison felt. On the
Speaker 1: other hand, you got to do what's in the best
Speaker 1: interest of your client. You have a fiduciary responsibility in
Speaker 1: a sense. Were you in favor of Alison speaking out
Speaker 1: or did you try and say to her, look just
Speaker 1: lay low.
Speaker 3: I felt there was a real problem in the industry already,
Speaker 3: and separate from Alison, was on background helping the New
Speaker 3: York Times reporter connect with different athletes that I thought
Speaker 3: would be good for her story, helping her to understand
Speaker 3: the landscape of what was happening in Sport and what
Speaker 3: was wrong with what was going on in Sport. And
Speaker 3: you know, as she started to see some of what
Speaker 3: was going on with Allison and her birth experience, she
Speaker 3: asked me, do you think Allison would be a part
Speaker 3: of this? And you know, to Allison's point of not
Speaker 3: rocking the boat, being really terrified, my immediate response to
Speaker 3: her was equally the same.
Speaker 4: I was terrified. I felt very.
Speaker 3: Strongly on what the right thing was, So it wasn't
Speaker 3: hard to know what are you supposed to do here?
Speaker 3: But you mentioned that fiduciary responsibility. It was Yeah, if
Speaker 3: we blow this up, for sure, you're not going to
Speaker 3: be able to go back to Nike. That's not an option.
Speaker 3: But it might be really hard to go anywhere because
Speaker 3: a lot of times people don't like the troublemaker, and
Speaker 3: there's a fear that all you're going to do is
Speaker 3: come into the next organization and cause trouble. As time
Speaker 3: went on, what started to become a real conversation where
Speaker 3: I could then say to her, is this something you
Speaker 3: would consider? And I'm so glad she was willing to
Speaker 3: do it.
Speaker 1: In fact, you were right Nike and Allison collectively as
Speaker 1: a team. You parted ways, right, But you got Nike
Speaker 1: to change its policies in the process.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was about two and a half weeks after
Speaker 2: the op ed came out they changed their policy and
Speaker 2: today they offer eighteen months of maternal protections for their
Speaker 2: female athletes. And some other companies came forward as well.
Speaker 2: So that was all great, you know, it was amazing
Speaker 2: for all the women who get to benefit.
Speaker 5: But I was done and out and I didn't get that.
Speaker 1: Were you disappointed or you knew that that was coming
Speaker 1: and so it was inevitable.
Speaker 5: I didn't know it was coming.
Speaker 2: I was really disappointed in the fact of like, that's
Speaker 2: exactly what we asked.
Speaker 4: For, you know.
Speaker 2: It was like, it's only because we went public that
Speaker 2: anything changed. And so I just a company of that size,
Speaker 2: like I always felt like it was doable, you know.
Speaker 2: So there was just so much resistance since and then
Speaker 2: when it didn't look so great then for them to
Speaker 2: come around to me, that was the disappointing part. But
Speaker 2: at the end, I was happy that the policy changed,
Speaker 2: for sure.
Speaker 1: Both of you talked about the industry specifically female athletes.
Speaker 1: But do you see any difference between that instance and
Speaker 1: what other women have been experiencing in other workplaces for years?
Speaker 1: In essence, choose your path, choose your course. You want
Speaker 1: to be a mom, you want to you want to
Speaker 1: be a wife, or do you want to work?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I mean to me, that was a thing, like I
Speaker 2: wrote the New York Times op ed, and a flood
Speaker 2: of women came to me like it resonated they had
Speaker 2: been through something similar and to me, it's devastating, like
Speaker 2: that was twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, like that that many
Speaker 2: people have been affected, and I guess it shouldn't be
Speaker 2: shocked by that, but really heartbreaking that, you know, even
Speaker 2: in the spaces where people are saying the right things,
Speaker 2: women still know they might get taken off of things,
Speaker 2: or they're still hiding pregnancies, and it's just really unfortunate.
Speaker 1: We talked about your five consecutive Olympic appearances twenty four, eight, twelve, sixteen.
Speaker 1: Here comes twenty in Tokyo, and you don't have Nike,
Speaker 1: You've given birth a couple of years before. How hard
Speaker 1: is it, both physically and emotionally to say I want
Speaker 1: to do this one more time, I want to race
Speaker 1: in the Olympics in Tokyo.
Speaker 4: I think it was.
Speaker 5: Easy to say that I wanted to.
Speaker 2: You know, I think I was on fire, especially after
Speaker 2: parting ways with Nike. I felt like no one believed
Speaker 2: that I could do it. But then I think after
Speaker 2: I set out to do it, then I started to
Speaker 2: like have the doubts myself, like, Okay, well maybe they
Speaker 2: are right.
Speaker 5: I'm a new mother.
Speaker 2: I don't have the support of Nike, during that time,
Speaker 2: we were trying to figure out how to do it ourselves,
Speaker 2: and it was a lot of pressure to be up
Speaker 2: against and being thirty five and just unsure if it
Speaker 2: would come together was tough.
Speaker 1: Can you speak in broad terms? And obviously everybody's story
Speaker 1: is different, but since you wrote about it in the
Speaker 1: New York Times, it created this split with Nike. You
Speaker 1: feel so.
Speaker 4: Strongly about it.
Speaker 1: What is it like to give birth and then try
Speaker 1: and come back as a world class athlete.
Speaker 5: It was so humbling.
Speaker 2: I think, like things I never ever even thought about,
Speaker 2: like doing drills or jogging.
Speaker 5: They were things that I could not do.
Speaker 2: And so I had this whole plan of I'm going
Speaker 2: to give birth and I'm gonna be back four weeks later,
Speaker 2: and I know how to train hard, I know how
Speaker 2: to do all those things, but my mind was telling
Speaker 2: me I could do those things. But after the emergency
Speaker 2: C section, after being in the NIKU for a month,
Speaker 2: spending time around the clock there, it just threw off everything.
Speaker 2: And so it was like starting from not even from
Speaker 2: the bottom, but from like below that. It was like
Speaker 2: it felt like I wasn't even an athlete, Like I
Speaker 2: tried to do simple things in my body wasn't responding,
Speaker 2: and so that's really when I start to question, can
Speaker 2: I get back to me? Because I didn't feel any
Speaker 2: parts of myself.
Speaker 1: Did you feel that other athletes were looking at you
Speaker 1: at this point in your mid thirties without a sponsor
Speaker 1: and saying what are you doing here?
Speaker 4: Oh?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I felt like everybody was.
Speaker 2: And I've heard the chatter also, you know, it wasn't
Speaker 2: just a feeling. It was like they're literally saying it.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm the oldest, I have a new baby,
Speaker 2: like I'm competing against like kids, and so I felt
Speaker 2: very different than everybody else who was out there.
Speaker 1: I'm assuming there was also some thought in that this
Speaker 1: is going to be your last Olympics, most likely in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty in Tokyo, win or lose, and that you're
Speaker 1: going to make the transition into a new career. Where
Speaker 1: does the idea come from to create your own company?
Speaker 4: Sache?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it really came just in the conversation of me
Speaker 2: venting to Wes, and it was at or that hunt
Speaker 2: of like, Okay, is there anyone out here who will
Speaker 2: give me shoes to run in the Olympics? And I
Speaker 2: just felt so disheartened because I felt like, Okay, I
Speaker 2: feel like I have enough of accomplishments to get a sponsor,
Speaker 2: and when we couldn't find it was it's like, I
Speaker 2: think we should do this ourselves.
Speaker 5: And at first I was like, that's too big of
Speaker 5: a thing.
Speaker 2: At the time, it was like, you know, the beginning
Speaker 2: of the pandemic, the Olympics had been postponed a year,
Speaker 2: there was just so much going on. But then I
Speaker 2: sat with it and I realized that it was actually
Speaker 2: a great idea and it gave us the opportunity to
Speaker 2: create change and do things our way. And we thought
Speaker 2: what we were doing was creating shoes that I could
Speaker 2: just wear in the Olympics and that maybe other women
Speaker 2: would want to support that too. But as we made
Speaker 2: the deep dive into just that industry, we learned that
Speaker 2: shoes they're made off of mold, and it's a mold
Speaker 2: of a man's foot used to make women sneakers.
Speaker 5: And that was kind of the turning point for us.
Speaker 2: It was like, not only are we going to try
Speaker 2: to do something and create change for me, but we're
Speaker 2: going to try to push in industry and do something
Speaker 2: that isn't being done and then we were off to
Speaker 2: the races.
Speaker 1: This might seem like a fairly trite question, you know
Speaker 1: when somebody asked you, oh, can you pick one moment,
Speaker 1: but I'm going to take giving birth off the table,
Speaker 1: so you can't use that one on me.
Speaker 4: But you know, you go.
Speaker 1: To the twenty twenty Olympics in Tokyo. Everybody's wondering why
Speaker 1: you're there. You're hearing it. You don't have the sponsor,
Speaker 1: you're thirty five years old.
Speaker 7: And another a seventh gold medal to go home on
Speaker 7: and retire from the Olympics for Alison Felix.
Speaker 1: And you come out of there with a bronze and
Speaker 1: the four hundred, but a gold medal is part of
Speaker 1: the four hundred relay team? Is that the icing on
Speaker 1: the cake is that I'm done moment wave goodbye?
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: To me, it was literally crossing the line like in
Speaker 2: the safe spikes that we created, was like it was
Speaker 2: bigger than the sport. Like for me for the first time,
Speaker 2: as someone who's very clear cut about success and failure,
Speaker 2: that moment was just about so much more than any
Speaker 2: of that. And so you know, I did one more
Speaker 2: year after that and kind of said my thank yous,
Speaker 2: But that was the highlight looking back of everything, and for.
Speaker 7: Alison feel like she is the goodbye gold for her
Speaker 7: three sixteen eighty four.
Speaker 1: Wes you see that moment in Tokyo dropped the tough
Speaker 1: exterior tears.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that there was so much emotion in
Speaker 3: all of the ways. We had just fought so hard
Speaker 3: and fought a battle that we didn't even know was coming.
Speaker 3: And there was a conversation Allison and I had two
Speaker 3: nights before her final where she really opened up and
Speaker 3: was just telling me that she was scared and she
Speaker 3: didn't know if she could do it, you know, And
Speaker 3: our conversation I'll never forget was the goal is the same,
Speaker 3: but it's different, and you're saying you don't think you
Speaker 3: can do it, but that's because you think there's only
Speaker 3: one medal, but there isn't only one medal, there are three,
Speaker 3: and you need to think about shifting what your goal
Speaker 3: is for the very first time, you know, and I
Speaker 3: think as a brother and a manager, it was the
Speaker 3: first time I ever felt safe telling her you don't
Speaker 3: have to win, and that's how I knew, like, Okay,
Speaker 3: we're at the end, you know, like we're at the
Speaker 3: end of this part of the journey because gold isn't
Speaker 3: the goal anymore and it doesn't need to be. That's
Speaker 3: so beautiful, but that means I think, as a brother
Speaker 3: and sister, we've done something for real, in real life,
Speaker 3: we understand actually what the purpose was, and it was
Speaker 3: never winning. And so seeing her sitting there on the
Speaker 3: track COVID Olympics, so we weren't able to be there,
Speaker 3: but it's five o'clock in the morning, and you know,
Speaker 3: we're sitting on my parents' couch and Cameron is sleeping,
Speaker 3: you know, on her dad's lap, and we're waking her
Speaker 3: up and we're jumping and we're screaming, and she's getting happy,
Speaker 3: and you know, we just see Alison down there trying
Speaker 3: to catch her breath the way I've seen her with
Speaker 3: her hands around her knees probably hundreds of times before,
Speaker 3: just exhausted, and seeing her in the shoes. I think
Speaker 3: also knowing for me there was something that I told
Speaker 3: her that I haven't delivered on yet but I still
Speaker 3: will is I will make sure you are the highest
Speaker 3: paid female athlete in sports. And what I was able
Speaker 3: to think about in that moment was here you are
Speaker 3: You're in your own shoes, we made them. Your company
Speaker 3: has a ten figure valuation that is more money than
Speaker 3: you would ever have a chance to ever make in
Speaker 3: your entire career at Nike as a runner, and you're
Speaker 3: doing it your way, on your terms, for your daughter,
Speaker 3: and you're showing every other woman that you don't have
Speaker 3: to just do what you're told, you can actually create
Speaker 3: something different. And so yeah, I can't imagine a moment
Speaker 3: more emotional or where I've really been more proud of
Speaker 3: anything else and did on the track.
Speaker 1: Allison, You've got a future of motherhood in front of you,
Speaker 1: a successful company, social activism, an advocate for women and
Speaker 1: female athletes in general, so much to look forward to.
Speaker 1: But I've never spoken to an athlete who's reached the
Speaker 1: levels that you have that hasn't had a moment of,
Speaker 1: oh gosh, it's over. There's maybe a little bit of depression.
Speaker 1: It's tough emotionally, it's tough physically. What's been the hardest
Speaker 1: part stepping away from the track.
Speaker 2: I think it's definitely working through the sadness of it,
Speaker 2: the loss of it that I absolutely loved every single
Speaker 2: well not every single but I loved running. I love
Speaker 2: that I got to wake up and train for five
Speaker 2: hours a day, and that is just a part of
Speaker 2: who I am. And I think the most challenging part
Speaker 2: is not like what is my next step or you know,
Speaker 2: I feel really grateful and blessed that that's all mapped out,
Speaker 2: But I think it's waking up and not having that training,
Speaker 2: not getting to see my coach every day, not having
Speaker 2: that very tangible goal and working towards it.
Speaker 5: You know, it's just a very different thing.
Speaker 2: And so I think no matter where you end at,
Speaker 2: if it's at the highest of the high or if
Speaker 2: you didn't quite do the things that you wanted, I
Speaker 2: think that part is all the same, the walking away
Speaker 2: and the missing it.
Speaker 1: How different is life today without competition like that in
Speaker 1: terms of eating and just simply exercising every day.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's so different.
Speaker 2: I think the biggest thing I'm like, when do people exercise?
Speaker 2: Like I didn't know that this was a thing like
Speaker 2: either early in the morning or late at night and
Speaker 2: trying to fit that way, and also just like trying
Speaker 2: to find my new relationship with sport. And I think
Speaker 2: I've been so used to such an intense training schedule.
Speaker 2: I was at the track a couple months ago when
Speaker 2: I was doing this insane workout and pushing myself to
Speaker 2: the limits, and I just kind of had this moment
Speaker 2: where I paused and I.
Speaker 5: Was like, I don't have to be here like this.
Speaker 5: I don't have to do this.
Speaker 2: And so right now it's just been finding the new things,
Speaker 2: you know, taking tennis lessons and trying to like dial.
Speaker 5: It back a little bit and do new things.
Speaker 1: What are you guys looking forward to with the shoes.
Speaker 2: I think we're most proud right now that we just
Speaker 2: launched the Felix Runner, which is our performance running shoe,
Speaker 2: and so excited just to see it in the world
Speaker 2: and get to see women wear it and running it.
Speaker 2: And our hope is that we continue to grow, that
Speaker 2: more people know about us, know our origin story. For me,
Speaker 2: I love when I get to see women wearing the
Speaker 2: shoes and I connect with them and they usually have
Speaker 2: a story about feeling like it's so much bigger than
Speaker 2: the shoes. It's a movement. It's a sign that they
Speaker 2: stand for women and with women. I just hope that
Speaker 2: you know, we continue to get out there and see
Speaker 2: more of that happening.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you this as we close, and I
Speaker 1: would like each of you to just take a minute
Speaker 1: to think about this, or maybe it'll jump to.
Speaker 6: You right off the net.
Speaker 1: What does the heart of the game mean to you?
Speaker 3: To me, it's understanding the real purpose of the game.
Speaker 3: I think that so many times we think it's about winning,
Speaker 3: it's about pushing yourself. It's really about other people. I
Speaker 3: feel so fortunate for us it's getting to be around
Speaker 3: the Olympics and the World Championships. The heart of the
Speaker 3: game is the beauty, the purpose, the essence of why
Speaker 3: we actually play these games, and it's not to break records.
Speaker 3: I think it's to inspire Allison.
Speaker 2: For me, I think it's very similar, but really why
Speaker 2: you ever do it? And I think for many of
Speaker 2: us it starts out being because you want to win
Speaker 2: and because you're competitive and you want to be the best.
Speaker 2: And that was my experience, and then you kind of
Speaker 2: uncover what's really at the heart of it all. And
Speaker 2: for me, it was learning about myself and learning about
Speaker 2: that I'm so much more than just the game, you know,
Speaker 2: I'm here for a bigger purpose than that, and my
Speaker 2: experience led me to that. So to me, it's about
Speaker 2: really uncovering the layers of what's really at the core
Speaker 2: of it all for you as the person discovering it.
Speaker 1: And let me just close this way, because I wanted
Speaker 1: to ask you this, and you can tell me, Allison,
Speaker 1: what does it feel like to run that fast?
Speaker 5: When I have the race that goes pretty well?
Speaker 6: For me?
Speaker 2: It actually feels kind of easy. It feels like everything
Speaker 2: is clicking. It makes sense, it feels natural. I'm not
Speaker 2: fighting against it. It just kind of feels like time
Speaker 2: is almost slowing down. That's the best way that I
Speaker 2: can put it.
Speaker 1: Her running days may be behind her, but a US
Speaker 1: and Felix isn't done competing. She continues to push to
Speaker 1: help female athletes and put them on a level playing field.
Speaker 1: It's a positively Olympian goal, but a career is proof
Speaker 1: that Alison Felix knows how to win. On the next
Speaker 1: episode of Heart of the Game, we'll talk with brothers
Speaker 1: in former Bad Boys of Tennis, Luke and Murphy Jensen.
Speaker 1: Murphy shares how his personal demons derailed their career and
Speaker 1: how he survived a terrifying heart attack.
Speaker 6: It took seventeen minutes for the ambulance to get there
Speaker 6: and in that time, he had flatlined four times. What
Speaker 6: do you say to someone who's been your best friend,
Speaker 6: your brother, and you're saying goodbye. The only thing that
Speaker 6: kept popping in my mind is we have this model
Speaker 6: that Jensen's never quit. You can lose, you can be tired,
Speaker 6: but Jensen's never quit.
Speaker 1: Part of the Game is a production of Ruby's Studio
Speaker 1: from iHeartMedia. Our show is hosted by me John Frankl.
Speaker 1: Our executive producer is Matt Romano. Our EP of Post
Speaker 1: Production is Matt Stillo. Our supervising producer is Nikiah Swinton.
Speaker 1: This show was edited by Sierra Spreen. Our writer and
Speaker 1: researcher is Mike Avilla. Thanks for listening. We'll see you
Speaker 1: next time.