--- title: Nike's Wimbledon Dress Was Bad for Tennis Players description: The short style interfered with on-court mobility canonical: https://time.com/4388375/nikes-wimbledon-dresses-uncomfortable/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-06-29T22:03:35.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T09:02:51.135Z og:title: Nike's Wimbledon Dress Was Anything But an Ace og:description: The short style interfered with on-court mobility og:url: https://time.com/4388375/nikes-wimbledon-dresses-uncomfortable/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb3fb838392fa7510/69889a153c1639416545ddac/nike-wimbledon-dresses.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Day Three: The Championships - Wimbledon 2016 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Nike's Wimbledon Dress Was Anything But an Ace twitter:description: The short style interfered with on-court mobility twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb3fb838392fa7510/69889a153c1639416545ddac/nike-wimbledon-dresses.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Nike's Wimbledon Dress Was Anything But an Ace by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Jun 29, 2016 10:03 PM UTC  LONDON, ENGLAND - JUNE 29: Eugenie Bouchard of Canada serves during the Ladies Singles first round match against Magdalena Rybarikova of Slovakia on day three of the Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club on June 29, 2016 in London, England. (Photo by Julian Finney/Getty Images) LONDON, ENGLAND - JUNE 29: Eugenie Bouchard of Canada serves during the Ladies Singles first round match against Magdalena Rybarikova of Slovakia on day three of the Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club on June 29, 2016 in London, England. (Photo by Julian Finney/Getty Images)Julian Finney/Getty Images by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Jun 29, 2016 10:03 PM UTC The outfits that Nike designed for some of the women playing at Wimbledon were not a love match. Players are required to wear all white at [Wimbledon](http://time.com/3954568/serena-williams-wimbledon-trophy/), and Nike pays some athletes to wear their gear. But this year’s dresses fell short—really short. The babydoll style, which the New York [_Times_](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/sports/tennis/nike-wimbledon-premier-slam-dress.html) points out “is more commonly associated with lingerie and sleepwear than athletic performance,” caused problems for many athletes. Rebecca Peterson of Sweden told the _Times_, “When I was serving, it was coming up, and I felt like the dress was just everywhere.” Other women improvised to keep the dress in place. Peterson wore long-sleeved shirt over the dress to keep it in place. Katie Boulter wore a headband around her waist to double as a belt. [**_Follow Motto on Facebook_**](https://www.facebook.com/mottoworkplaylive/) [Nike](http://time.com/4250747/nike-dumps-maria-sharapova-after-failed-drug-test/) initially touted the dress as “a departure from the skirt-top combinations worn in previous Grand Slams,” according to the _Times_. [Not all players](http://time.com/4250747/nike-dumps-maria-sharapova-after-failed-drug-test/) criticized it. Maria Sakkari calls the dress one of her favorite tennis outfits: “I think it’s a very pretty dress, and I think that it’s very feminine.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4388375/nikes-wimbledon-dresses-uncomfortable/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4388375/nikes-wimbledon-dresses-uncomfortable/"},"headline":"Nike's Wimbledon Dress Was Anything But an Ace","datePublished":"2016-06-29T22:03:35.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T09:02:51.135Z","description":"The short style interfered with on-court mobility","url":"https://time.com/4388375/nikes-wimbledon-dresses-uncomfortable/","keywords":["motto","tennis"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb3fb838392fa7510/69889a153c1639416545ddac/nike-wimbledon-dresses.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb3fb838392fa7510/69889a153c1639416545ddac/nike-wimbledon-dresses.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Day Three: The Championships - Wimbledon 2016","caption":"Day Three: The Championships - Wimbledon 2016","creditText":"Julian Finney/Getty Images","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/motto/","name":"motto"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4388375/nikes-wimbledon-dresses-uncomfortable/","name":"Nike's Wimbledon Dress Was Anything But an Ace"}}]}] ```