The weird light-grey patch was doomed to draw attention to the crotch area and spur a barrage of tweets, either poking fun at the costume and its “creative” designer, or calling it a disgrace. And if you have been wondering whether these uniforms are only for female athletes, don’t worry there is a male “edition,” too.
Some could not simply comprehend the very idea behind it and probably didn’t even need to understand:
Some users even reminded everyone of other strange uniforms, which the American speed skaters’ seems to have outstripped:
Reddit users also showed solidarity with Twitterians, saying it looked like a giant target:
“Ha-ha I kept laughing as I watched the Olympics because of these suits, my husband thought I was ridiculous. Glad to know I wasn’t the only one thinking it looks like a giant target on their vagina,” wrote user nicknamed ilikepeopl.
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“I can imagine the design team stoned, laughing, and saying, "No way is this going to make it into production,” said martinelee07.
Apparently, there is an adequate explanation for the oddly designed uniform:
“The black regions are padded for warmth. The silver colored crotch material is a carbon synthetic that cannot be coated with anything to color match it. The amount of friction that it would generate if it were color matched would slow them down by fractions of a second. Same thing with the black material, these are just slightly modified navy skinsuits,” user nicknamed Jnetpodx elaborated.