Olympic Classics – Great Britain, 1992

The Games of the XXXIII Olympiad – to give them their full title – currently taking place in Paris are the 11th edition of the summer Olympics to feature Great Britain in adidas outfits, a 40-year stretch dating back to 1984 in Los Angeles.

With so many different disciplines comprising an ‘Olympic team’, manufacturers have to come up with a wide array of garments while still seeking to connect them all to an over-arching design philosophy.

The Stella McCartney set used by Team GB for London 2012 is perhaps the most famous Olympic kit and certainly helped to increase subsequent attention paid to the designs worn by the athletes.

For this writer, personal bias obviously plays a massive part as the 1992 Games in Barcelona are the first that I can recall but the Great Britain garb left a lasting mark.

Obviously, the fact I have a soft spot for adidas and the mixing of blue, white and red played a part but the pattern used on most of the strips – a series of distorted Union Flags, back when such things were treated as acceptable artistic flourishes rather than acts of treachery – was a good way of tying everything together.

Barcelona ’92 came a year after the advent of the aggressive adidas Equipment branding – France’s athletics outfits were not unlike what Great Britain would have in 1996 while in handball they wore the same as the country’s football team – but GB’s set was a mix of pre- and post-Equipment, with the signature three-stripe branding just the adidas wordmark (albeit with one exception, as we shall see).

There may be some omissions – please let us know if you know of any – but these were the main items of clothing used by British competitors.

Athletics

Track & field is of course a wide umbrella that takes in a number of disciplines and so athletes were given options that best suited them.

From left, 400m hurdler Kriss Akabusi favoured a single leotard while Roger Black, who competed in the ‘normal’ 400m (and partnered Akabusi as Britain won bronze in the 4x400m relay) opted for a singlet and shorter shorts.

Linford Christie, the gold medallist in the 100m, did use the leotard in a heat but for the final, he chose the singlet and cycling shorts. Sally Gunnell, the women’s 400m hurdles winner, used the female version of the single-piece outfit whereas Liz McColgan – fifth in the 10,000m – wore a two-piece.

Boxing

Up until 1988, national colours had been permitted in boxing but for 1992, the terms blue and red corner were taken literally – presumably to aid judges in scoring fights, as they have instruments with blue and buttons on them.

This was obviously not a huge problem for Great Britain but it seems that simple designs were demanded by the International Olympic Council, on the tops at least, as the white shorts were the only area where the distinctive design appeared.

Cycling

As we saw with Linford Christie, there were bespoke Team GB cycling shorts available but, for whatever reason, cycling itself was an exception to the overall design theme.

The fact that this was still an amateur sport in Olympic terms was possibly a factor in the dominance of the British Cycling Federation logo, but the kit worn by Chris Boardman – featuring the adidas trefoil – as he took gold certainly stood out compared to those worn by other British competitors.

Hockey

We recently looked at the wide proliferation of combinations used by the Great Britain men’s and women’s teams at the 2000 Games.

While there was not as much mashing up in Barcelona, there were still five different looks across the two genders. The women’s team took bronze, beating Korea in the third-place play-off.

Rowing

Nothing actually new here but it’s worth noting how the men’s athletics leotard was also used by the gold medal-winning Steve Redgrave and Matthew Pinsent (coxless pair) and Greg Searle, Jonathan Searle and Garry Herbert (coxed pair).

Tennis

The shorts used by the British men were the same as the white set worn by the hockey team, though the women’s skirts differed.

More notably, rather than simply using the white hockey polo shirt style, instead there was a different design, featuring the flag pattern as a sash.

Tracksuit

While not a part of the kit per se in that it wasn’t worn in any event, the tracksuit received plenty of exposure as Great Britain won 20 medals (five gold, three silver and 12 bronze).

It’s fair to say that it was the very essence of early 1990s design sensibilities but, judging by it presence on second-hand sites, the version sold to the public (featuring the trefoil and a different Team GB logo) was quite popular.