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When I was watching the Los Angeles Sparks win a Saturday night game a few months ago at the Crypto.com Arena in Downtown Los Angeles, I couldn’t help but wonder what my life would have been like had I not developed early, gotten my period by 10 years old, and boobs before everyone else. I was a young athlete and I loved playing basketball. But my changing body, lack of sports bra options in the ’90s, and the way others viewed me caused me to drop out of sports all together.
I doubt I would have ever been on the Los Angeles Sparks but maybe I would have felt more comfortable in my body had I continued playing sports. I’ll never really know. Dove and Nike and working to change that for young girls everywhere. They teamed up to launch the Body Confident Sport coaching program. The new online tools were proven in clinical trials with more than 1,200 girls to improve girls’ (11-17 years old) self-esteem and body confidence.
The two brands worked on the project for two years, in partnership with world-renowned experts, including the Centre for Appearance Research (CAR) and the Tucker Center for Research on Girls & Women in Sport. They also brought in Venus Williams in partnership with Dove and Laurie Hernandez in partnership with Nike to help raise awareness of the program.
We know this project is so important, in part, because of new research from the Dove Self-Esteem Project and Nike. They found that a whopping 41 percent of “teenage girls are dropping out of sports and body confidence concerns are the number one reason girls are dropping out” and “over half of US girls (56 percent) who have dropped out of sports say they were mocked, criticized and bullied because of their body size.”
The study found that having a coach can help. 76 percent of “girls in the US say they would stay in sports longer if they had a coach they can identify with” and “2 in 3 girls say they would be more body confident if they had stayed in sports longer,” a stat that hits close to home for me and so many women.
“In sports, girls often face a tremendous amount of pressure, not just around performance and abilities, but also because of unrealistic expectations around their appearances,” Venus Williams, tennis champion and entrepreneur, said in a statement. “I am excited to be working with Dove on this initiative to help nurture girls’ self-belief and confidence, foster a positive environment, and shift the conversation from appearance to capability. Our shared goal is to make sports a more inclusive, welcoming space for girls everywhere.”
Gold Medal Olympic Gymnast Laurie Hernandez echoed that statement. “We know that sports offer girls enormous benefits,” she said. “Coaches and athletes alike have a collective responsibility to create inclusive spaces and positive experiences that give all girls an opportunity to discover the power of sports. Sports fuels confidence, which in turn enables girls to enjoy a lifetime of moving and playing the sports they love. This is why I’m so proud to team up with Nike to support Body Confident Sport.”
Head to the Body Confident Sport website for resources and to find ways you can help girls in your community. You never know what they’ll become.
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Elizabeth Denton
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