RunRaider wrote:
UO gave all of their sponsored athletes an option out of their contracts. See: Rachel Schneider to HOKA right before the Trials.
So it sounds like UA may be pushing track athletes out the door to cut spending on track without saying so.
Is anyone actually using the pause in sponsorship to run in competitors shoes until UA comes out with a competitive model? It sounds like athletes are just choosing to leave and not return after a pause.
What would be the minimum length of the pause? Could it be one of the following?
1) through the length of the athlete's sponsorship contract which would make it the same as cutting the athlete
or
2) until UAT comes out with a carbon plated, Pebax shoe that is competitive. The date of that may be never as maybe UA is not interested in spending on what it would take. Did UA even have a competitive shoe before the advent of competitive shoes?
It sounds like the old you can resign from your position/job to make it sound like it was you decision (leave with some dignity) or we are going to fire you or make your life hell until you do leave.
Would any athlete take the pause and return option even if returning were even possible. Who would offer an athlete any sponsorship knowing going in that the athlete is intending to go back to UA after the Olympics or after UA comes out with competitive shoes?
Posting in the message board stated some sponsor have allowed their runners to compete in competitors shoes in the past or will at the Olympics. It is telling that UA did not offer this option. Have any athletes sponsored by shoes companies actually competed thus far at the trials in a shoe from a competitor?