Nike, Ralph Lauren and USOC make sure U.S. sports winning look at Olympics

CHICAGO - With flashbulbs popping and cameras rolling, Bryan Clay stood on the makeshift fashion runway, trying to look serious as a smile crept across his face.

The Olympic decathlete was covered head to toe in red, white and blue, the colors he will wear at the Beijing Games in August. And Nike's swoosh logo was plastered on his jacket, pants and shoes.

"This is a perfect fit," Clay said last week at a Chicago hotel.

Nike and the U.S. Olympic Committee agree.

The world's leading footwear and athletic apparel provider and the Colorado Springs organization have enjoyed a three-year partnership that was extended this month through the 2012 London Games.

Nike receives continued exposure under the agreement - financial terms were not disclosed - as all Americans who finish in the top three at the next three Olympics will don the company's gear on the medal stand.

In return, the USOC and its athletes get instant credibility from their Nike association, especially in China, where Nike makes a third of its shoes and generates its second-most revenue after the U.S.

Credibility also comes from the USOC's new partnership with Polo Ralph Lauren Corp., the New York-based designer clothing company that will provide opening and closing ceremonies outfits and Olympic Village wear.

Financial terms of the one-year agreement, struck this month after the USOC and Canadian apparel company Roots Ltd. agreed to terminate their contract, were not disclosed.

"Walking into the Opening Ceremony with Ralph Lauren and having your athletes attired with Nike, they're a great team," said Norman Bellingham, chief operating officer of the USOC. "We could have purchased something off the rack."

Nike innovation

Nike became a USOC sponsor in 2005 and dressed U.S. athletes at the 2006 Turin Games. In Beijing, it plans to outfit thousands of athletes from 100-plus countries, including an estimated 600 Americans in all 28 Summer Games sports.

Its trademark U.S. piece is the "Windrunner," a hooded warmup suit. Men's medal winners will wear blue jackets and blue shoes. Women's medal winners will wear red jackets and red shoes. Both will wear blue pants.

The jacket, sported by track and field athletes at the 1984 Los Angeles Games, has the USOC's five-ringed logo and the Nike swoosh on the front and "USA" in three-inch letters on the back. A 1½-inch American flag is on the left sleeve.

"When you look good, you're going to feel good," said BMX cyclist Kyle Bennett, whose sport will make its Olympic debut in Beijing. "You can see the red, white and blue. It's not too flashy, but it catches your eye."

Inside the jacket, a message reads, "Amazing awaits. You've been training for this all your life. Now, as an Olympian, you represent the highest level of competition in the realm of athletics. Your commitment and your achievement honor the United States of America and ennoble the human spirit. In the dignity, integrity, and entirety of your effort, lies victory for us all. Amazing awaits."

"That's what it's about," said Clay, a silver medalist at the 2004 Athens Games. "That's what I would like to represent more than anything - inspiration for younger people to say, ‘If he can do it, I can do it.' Hopefully in 15 years (they will) be standing on the podium where I was standing."

Nike has created taekwondo and BMX shoes and equestrian boots for the first time at the Olympics. It also has manufactured its lightest shoes in track and basketball.

More than 100 Nike employees teamed to produce the track and basketball shoes, made of a webbing of super-resilient fibers that offer support and literally grab a person's foot.

"If everyone was happy with what existed in '72 or '76 or '80, imagine all the things we would have missed," said Dean Stoyer, U.S. media relations director for Nike. "You have to give the credit to the athlete."

Stoyer said the extended agreement enables Nike to "provide more of what we can bring to athletes. In a pure business sense, it's also for exposure. ... That's pretty powerful when you consider the amount of TV time and exposure the Games are getting now."

"It allows us to look to Vancouver (in 2010), look to London," he added. "The time and the allowance to design and create without tight deadlines and confines."

Pony power

USOC leaders thought the opening and closing ceremonies proposals submitted in January by Roots were too informal. Roots had been a USOC sponsor since the 2002 Salt Lake City Games.

Bellingham said his idea for the Aug. 24 Closing Ceremony garments came from "Chariots of Fire," an Academy Award-winning 1981 movie about British athletes in the 1924 Paris Games.

Preliminary sketches by Ralph Lauren have U.S. athletes wearing mesh, collared shirts with "Beijing" in Chinese characters on the front, V-neck sweater vests and ties, cargo pants and casual shoes.

Red, white and blue stripes run along the neck and the bottom of the vest, which features the USOC logo. The shorts have the USOC logo and Ralph Lauren's famous logo - a polo player on a horse.

The attire for the Aug. 8 Opening Ceremony will remain a secret, as has been the case at previous Olympics. In a press release, Ralph Lauren describes the Opening Ceremony wardrobes as reflecting the "heritage and sensibility of the 1920s and 1930s with a tailored and modern silhouette."

"It's classy," Bellingham said. "The arena is a place that requires an element of reverence. We want to make sure we're dressed appropriately, given how important this Opening Ceremony is for China. This is their coming-out party, and we want to make sure we're respectful of that."