The Evolution of Allyson Felix

Felix also applied her athlete’s mentality to the birth of her son, Trey, in April. “With Camryn, I think I was almost too tightly wound to my birth plan. When it didn’t happen, I was kind of distraught over it,” she says. “Understanding that other things can happen is a better way to be.” This time around she was intentional about controlling the controllables, working with a Black doctor and doula to prepare for the unmedicated vaginal birth she’d hoped for with her first pregnancy, all while acknowledging the fear and uncertainty in the experience.

Her second pregnancy proved to be a “healing experience.” But it was also marked by the reality that she still faced racial health disparities. “The second time around I understood the most important thing was being alive and having my baby. Going into this pregnancy, we revisited our will and made sure all of that was taken care of. Who wants to be doing those things?” Felix says. “But we knew what could happen and we wanted to be prepared.”

Ultimately, Felix had the unmedicated vaginal birth after cesarean, or VBAC, she hoped for. “Though I got in the middle and I was like, Did I really want this?” she says with a laugh.

Three months later Felix was at the Paris Olympics. It was the first Games in two decades that she hadn’t competed in. “I wasn’t sure what to expect. There’s this loss and grief over part of it,” she says. There was also excitement about experiencing the Olympics in a different way—such as having the chance to witness, with her daughter, Simone Biles win gold on vault. “I’m really glad that I’m at this point in my life right now where I do get to do this. Yeah, I have to pump at opening ceremonies, but I also have these two beautiful children and they’re with me at work and I get to take this all in with them,” she says.

Was there space to pump at the opening ceremony?

Felix cuts me off after “space,” anticipating the question before I can even finish.

“There wasn’t,” she says, describing the (“nicer?”) port-a-potty she resorted to. “There’s something else to tackle!”

With her recent election to the International Olympic Committee, Felix can actually tackle that problem in 2028. She was one of four athletes (three of whom are women) elected to an eight-year term representing athletes’ interests in designing the Olympic experience.

Being the high-achieving woman that she is, Felix is already thinking of ways she can be helpful—for one, learning about the process by which the USOPC can appeal the decision by the IOC to ask gymnast Jordan Chiles to return her bronze medal.

“My heart just broke for her because I feel like it tainted her entire Olympic Games. I was in the village campaigning for the IOC election the morning that the gymnastics team went to their team competition, and I ran into all the girls. They were just so excited and so happy and hopeful,” Felix says. “She’s such a young girl and, as a mother, I just feel like she should have been protected. None of this is on her at all, but she’s the one dealing with all of the effects of it.”

Continuing her work to support competing moms with plans for bigger and better on-site childcare options in LA will be a big part of her agenda. But supporting women holistically starts with listening. Working with athletes from around the globe “puts in perspective the viewpoints of every place in the world,” she says. “We’re always thinking about things that affect us in America, but this really is a global position. Seeing the issues some women in sport are facing is very sobering.” In the weeks following our interview, fellow Olympian Rebecca Cheptegei, a Ugandan distance runner who placed 44th in the marathon in Paris, was set on fire by a former partner and died as a result, a reminder of the gender-based violence and abuse that women athletes face at disproportionately high rates.