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Women athletes answer a betting ad with what they actually look like

9/18/2026

A sports-betting advertisement featuring a semi-nude Sydney Sweeney ran this week and landed on a powder keg. The ad, from gambling platform Novig, was aimed at a predominantly male sports-betting audience.

It triggered an athlete-led countermessage across social media that said more about where women's sports stands in 2026 than any single ad could intend.

The case for treating this as a cultural inflection point is in the specifics.

At the World Athletics Ultimate Championship, British sprinter Amy Hunt went on-air, smiling and out of breath after a race, and addressed the camera directly: "Sydney Sweeney, this is what women in sport look like: 21.4.