How This US Track Star Supports Moms at Olympics

Published: July 31, 2024

How This US Track Star Supports Moms at Olympics

By Movieguide® Contributor

U.S. track star Allyson Felix just changed the game for athletes with children — she helped establish the first-ever childcare center at the Olympics.

“It was top of mind to support athletes who are mothers,” Felix shared. “It’s a space where families can get away from it all and have some of the comforts of home. They can have playtime and have places to feed their babies. It’s meant to feel like home.”

Felix is a mom to two — Camryn, 5, and Trey, 3 months — and partnered with Pampers to create a space for children of athletes.

In a statement to CNN, she wrote, “After the birth of my daughter I understood how difficult it is to compete at the highest level while balancing the demands of parenthood.”

“The Olympic Games environment comes with a lot of complexity and pressures, and one way to offer relief is make it easier on athletes to spend time with their babies and young children without leaving the Athletes’ Village,” she continued. “I’m so pleased to partner with Pampers to make the Village Nursery a reality for the next generation of athletes who are chasing their dreams while also choosing parenthood.”

Felix told CBS News that this new space tells female athletes “that you can choose motherhood and also be at the top of your game.”

Movieguide® previously reported on how Felix balances motherhood and her athletic career:

Many believed that Olympic runner Allyson Felix would fail to compete for a medal at the Tokyo Olympics due to her emergency C-section in late 2018. However, the 10-time Olympic medal winner and new mother added to her medal count after winning gold in the 4x400m women’s relay.

Felix, who ran alongside U.S. teammates Sydney McLaughlin, Dalilah Muhammad and Athing Mu, won her 11th medal.

The 35-year-old sprinter said that the road to compete was difficult after she welcomed her daughter Camryn on Nov. 2, 2018.

“I had to go through challenges in the fight,” Felix said after the gold medal win in Tokyo. “I’m absolutely where I’m supposed to be. You know, sometimes I think you just have to fight through and I think it’s unfortunate. It’s not just me. And I think that that’s the biggest thing.”

She continued: “There have been so many women before me who had to stay silent about their fight. And so for me to be able to step out and I think my daughter gave me the courage to do that. But I think that was really the thing, that this has been going on for far too long. And I hope that we’re really changing things.”

Emma Terho, the athletes’ commission chair for the International Olympic Committee, was equally excited about the childcare center.

“We are seeing more and more athletes continuing in their career after [starting a family],” she told CNN. “Personally, knowing it can be difficult to combine both while focusing on your dreams, it doesn’t mean that you cannot be a parent and an athlete.”

Terho continued, “It’s important to make it easier to combine those aspects of life and to support athletes on and off the field. [Parenthood] is an important part of off-the-field. It is also very important to send the message that it doesn’t mean your career is coming to an end. The nursery, the amount of excitement and feedback we’ve been getting from athletes, shows this.”