--- title: ESPN The Magazine Body Issue: Michael Phelps and Venus Williams Naked description: See the six covers featuring nude athletes canonical: https://time.com/2967124/espn-body-issue-naked-athletes/ author: Eliana Dockterman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-07-08T19:59:11.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T08:55:37.108Z og:title: ESPN The Magazine's 2014 Body Issue Celebrates Different Physiques og:description: See the six covers featuring nude athletes og:url: https://time.com/2967124/espn-body-issue-naked-athletes/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt613da19c622abba8/69869ae913c79f22a6192fb4/jamiebody1.jpg?branch=production&width=1000&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1000 og:image:height: 563 og:image:alt: jamiebody1 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: ESPN The Magazine's 2014 Body Issue Celebrates Different Physiques twitter:description: See the six covers featuring nude athletes twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt613da19c622abba8/69869ae913c79f22a6192fb4/jamiebody1.jpg?branch=production&width=1000&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # _ESPN the Magazine_’s 2014 Body Issue Celebrates Different Physiques > Sponsored content. 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Worth Your Time is TIME's culture newsletter, published Tuesdays and Saturdays to 40,000 subscribers as of August 2026. #### Who writes TIME's culture recommendations? Culture editor Eliza Berman writes Worth Your Time, drawing on TIME's critics and culture desk. #### Is Worth Your Time free? Yes. It is a free newsletter available at time.com/newsletters.  by [Eliana Dockterman](https://time.com/author/eliana-dockterman/)  ## Eliana Dockterman Correspondent Jul 8, 2014 7:59 PM UTC  Jamie Anderson on the cover of ESPN the Magazine's 2014 Body Issue Jamie Anderson on the cover of ESPN the Magazine's 2014 Body Issue ESPN the Magazine  by [Eliana Dockterman](https://time.com/author/eliana-dockterman/)  ## Eliana Dockterman Correspondent Jul 8, 2014 7:59 PM UTC _ESPN the Magazine_’s Body Issue has always been an impressive feat in diversity. Both men and women pose nude for the photo shoots, and neither gender is objectified. Rather, the magazine is careful to celebrate the many different types of bodies that result from being in peak physical condition: sometimes that means slim waists for girls and large muscles for guys, but not always. Some athletes need larger leg muscles to propel themselves across a field, a court or ice. Others need to build their upper bodies for weightlifting. Some have tan lines from training outside, some tattoos and some scars. The result: very different-looking forms, though admittedly all impressive. Julie Chu, who was in the 2011 issue, [told TIME](http://time.com/6714/medals-arent-enough-female-olympians-still-have-to-sell-sexiness-2/) earlier this year, “I think that issue really highlights that there’s a lot of different types of bodies for elite athletes, and all of them can be beautiful and strong and confident.” This year’s selection in particular offers a wide range of male and female athletes, including (in order below) Olympic snowboarder Jamie Anderson, Seattle Seahawks running back Marshawn Lynch, Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps, Texas Ranger first baseman Prince Fielder, Oklahoma City Thunder forward Serge Ibaka and seven-time Grand Slam champion Venus Williams. And those are just the athletes on the covers. Here are some other athletes inside the pages: Olympic snowboarder Amy Purdy: World Cup soccer player Omar Gonzalez: > [](https://twitter.com/Omar4Gonzalez/status/486360911519555584) Olympic hockey player Hilary Knight: > [](https://twitter.com/Hilary%5FKnight/status/486579347554201600) World Tour surfer Coco Ho: > [](https://twitter.com/ESPN%5FSurf/status/486556105309691904) See the full slide show [here.](http://espn.go.com/espn/photos/gallery/%5F/id/11143740/image/1/venus-williams-bodies-want) \[[_ESPN_](http://espn.go.com/espn/photos/gallery/%5F/id/11143740/image/1/venus-williams-bodies-want)\] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/2967124/espn-body-issue-naked-athletes/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/2967124/espn-body-issue-naked-athletes/"},"headline":"ESPN the Magazine’s 2014 Body Issue Celebrates Different Physiques","datePublished":"2014-07-08T19:59:11.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T08:55:37.108Z","description":"See the six covers featuring nude athletes","url":"https://time.com/2967124/espn-body-issue-naked-athletes/","keywords":["Living","beauty"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt613da19c622abba8/69869ae913c79f22a6192fb4/jamiebody1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Eliana Dockterman","jobTitle":"Correspondent","url":"https://time.com/author/eliana-dockterman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt613da19c622abba8/69869ae913c79f22a6192fb4/jamiebody1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"jamiebody1","caption":"Jamie Anderson on the cover of ESPN the Magazine's 2014 Body Issue","creditText":"ESPN the Magazine","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-living/","name":"Living"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/2967124/espn-body-issue-naked-athletes/","name":"ESPN the Magazine’s 2014 Body Issue Celebrates Different Physiques"}}]}] ```