the most unflattering garment known to wo/man

i spent all day on sunday running around a grassy field, climbing all over a boat trailer, and rowing in my boat wearing what is perhaps the ugliest piece of athletic clothing on the planet: the unisuit. now, i realize that athletic clothing is supposed to be functional. depending on the nature of the sport, an athlete might need extra protection (think hockey pads) or as little between her/him and the environment as decently possible (think cycling or swimming), but i think the unisuit belongs in a category all its own. now maybe i'm just a little jaded because my university's crew has what has been voted by other rowers in their league as the ugliest unisuit around (see picture on left); i think, however, there is more to it than that. many people ask why rowers wear such a hideous garment -- and if you've seen a 55-year old, pot-bellied, old-schoolboy rower wearing one, you are well aware of the horrors of such a spandex display -- and there is a logical reason: in a boat there are a lot of moving parts including, but not limited to, your hands and your seat, which slides back and forth. the less loose fabric there is to catch on things the better. still, there is something about the unisuit that exudes a certain kind of ugliness. aside from the enhanced display the viewer receives of a man's "masculinity", it poses some other problems both aesthetic and practical.

cyclists, i think, looking smashing in their shorts and jerseys, but no matter how well-chiselled your body, no one really looks good in a unisuit. if you're a woman (with breasts, hips, thighs and a butt -- i know there are others of you out there!) it's especially unflattering. the garment's colour scheme depends on the colours of your team or club; ours are navy blue on the bottom and light blue on the top with a dark blue stripe across what one of my crewmates refers to as "the breastular area" (see picture in the post below). the blocks of colour fall in all the wrong places, drawing attention to portions of the female anatomy that any self-respecting woman with even a smidgin of body fat would, on a normal day, drape with sheaths of fabric (yes, i have thigh-specific body image issues). and just try manouvering around in a porta-potty when you're slick and sweaty after a race and trying with some grace to get back into one following your post-race pee. i'm telling you, it's a nightmare.

there's a bumpersticker out there that i plan on sticking on the door of every porta-potty at every regatta i attend this season in my one-woman campaign to get the designers of athletic clothing for rowers to rethink our sport's main garment. with a little alteration it will read: "keep (north) america beautiful. ban unisuits."