Saysh, the footwear brand founded by Olympian Allyson Felix and her brother, has launched “The Felix Runner” sneaker, the brand’s first perfomance running shoe. Felix, who has trained in the sneakers for more than a year, told FN that the shoe can basically be used by any typical active woman for running errands or marathons.
“I think the majority of women fall outside of the category of trying to break a world record for a marathon,” Allyson said to the outlet. “[But] it’s definitely a performance shoe and differs from our Saysh One which is more for light workouts and for walking. This is really our foray into that [performance] space.”
Felix, who had been a Nike athlete for years, recently spoke out about a life-threatening childbirth that nearly claimed her life and that of her daughter, Camryn. Felix had to undergo an emergency C-section to have her child. While recovering from her C-section, she proposed to renegotiate her contract with Nike for maternal protection that will ensure that she would not be punished if she didn’t perform well during her first week back.
RELATED STORIES
However, Nike refused her proposal and offered Felix a 70 percent pay cut. Dissatisfied with the offer, Felix broke ties with Nike in 2019 and also broke her non-disclosure agreement to tell her story. The Olympian went on to launch Saysh with her brother and business partner Wes and another founder, Darren Breedveld. Together they raised $3 million in seed money to get things started. The brand built exclusively for women now includes different styles such as the Saysh One and Saysh Two lifestyle sneakers and the Saysh Spike One racing shoe.
The Felix Runner comes with “a one-piece molded heel for stability, a flexible lacing mechanism and toe reinforcement on the upper”, FN wrote. The site added that the shoe was also created with Saysh’s FemiformityFIT technology, which has been designed to fit the unique shape of a woman’s foot.
American sprinter Felix recently became the most decorated U.S. track athlete in Olympic history. The athlete began her Olympic career at 18 years old when she competed in the 2004 Summer Games in Athens. The first time she won gold was at the Beijing Games.
