Pregnancy remains one of the most challenging moments in the careers of many high-performance athletes. Although an increasing number of women are returning to competition after becoming mothers, questions remain about the barriers they face during this process, the support they receive from their organizations, and the conditions needed to balance motherhood with elite sport. Aware of this reality, World Athletics has launched a new initiative aimed at deepening the understanding of these experiences.
Through the Childbirth and Return to Exercise in Elite Sport (CARES) project, the international federation seeks to gather scientific evidence and firsthand accounts from athletes to help shape future protection and support policies. The initiative combines research, data analysis, and active athlete participation with the goal of reducing inequalities and ensuring that no athlete’s sporting career is compromised by the decision to become a mother.
CARES: Research Focused on the Experiences of Female Athletes
The CARES project invites elite female athletes to participate in two surveys designed to better understand the needs and challenges associated with motherhood in sport. The first survey is aimed at athletes who have experienced a pregnancy since January 1, 2019, during their professional careers, regardless of whether the pregnancy resulted in childbirth. Through their responses, World Athletics hopes to gain insights into pregnancy, the return to competition, perceived barriers, support received, and the financial and contractual implications that may arise during this stage.
In addition to collecting personal testimonies, the research will include a retrospective analysis of the World Athletics database, incorporating athlete performance metrics. This combination of information will provide a more comprehensive understanding of motherhood in elite sport and help identify mechanisms that could support a fairer transition back to competition. Among the topics being explored are potential systems for maintaining world rankings during maternity leave, an issue that has become increasingly relevant in recent years.
The Challenge of Building a More Equitable Sport for Athlete Mothers
The second survey is aimed at elite female athletes who have not experienced pregnancy. In this case, the focus is on perceptions of existing organizational support, maternity-related policies, and governance measures that could promote greater equality of opportunity. In this way, World Athletics aims to incorporate different perspectives to better understand how these issues are viewed within the elite athletics ecosystem.
The President of World Athletics, Sebastian Coe, emphasized that the initiative is part of the organization’s ongoing commitment to building a more inclusive and equitable sport. Similarly, the Chair of the Athletes’ Commission, Valerie Adams, praised the progress that women’s sport has made in this area. The former athlete recalled that, during the early years of her career, many athletes avoided disclosing their pregnancies for fear of losing sponsorship contracts. Today, according to Adams, more and more women are successfully returning to elite-level competition after becoming mothers, a transformation she hopes will continue to grow through initiatives such as CARES and the implementation of policies grounded in the realities of athletes themselves.
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