Fashion
Elite Sportswear
Fashion
In our latest issue (W*113) we featured a fashion story on elite sports clothing, photographed on athletes at the Comex Hyperbaric Experimental Centre in Marseille (Rocket Men, p 170) by Jonathan de Villiers.
The garments, some of which were created specifically for competitors at the upcoming Beijing Olympic Games, were painstakingly designed to allow top performers maximum freedom of movement with minimum drag – like wearing nothing at all, only better. The pieces incorporate performance-enhancing attributes (of the legal variety) such as core cooling, ventilation, enhanced traction and moisture reduction.
The technology and science behind the specialist gear is fascinatingly advanced, more what you’d expect from the laboratories of NASA than Nike. But in the world of high-end athletics, where the difference between success and failure is measured in hundredths of a second, everything counts.
Scroll down to read about the Nike PreCool Vest, pictured above, or click on the links to the right for a closer look at some of the other featured garments.
Nike PreCool Vest
The idea behind Nike’s PreCool Vest – a chain mail-type garment filled with pockets of ice intended to be worn by athletes before competition – is that since 25% of the body’s energy goes into moving muscle and 75% into regulating heat, reducing heat beforehand leaves more energy available for competition.
The hermetically sealed insulated segments vary in size according to their positioning (smaller around the body’s curves, larger across flat sections such as the stomach) to create a fitted, clinging effect. According to Nike athletes can last up to 21% longer with core cooling. The garment pictured was created specially for athletes at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.
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