Nike Pro Elite
2020/21

The Double-Year Cycle

No Pro Elite generation lived a stranger life than this one. Issued for a 2020 season that barely happened, it waited out the pandemic year and was still being worn in the summer of 2021 — which is why genuine pieces carry the double stamp 2020/2021. The racing that did happen was mostly Nike athletes against the clock, in near-empty stadiums, and it produced more world records than any cycle in this archive.

Monaco, Valencia, Brussels, Hengelo

The cycle opened with product. In February 2020, at a Nike forum in New York, the brand showed the Air Zoom Alphafly Next% — the retail descendant of the Vienna shoe — alongside the Air Zoom Victory spike for 800 to 10,000 m. Joshua Cheptegei of the NN Running Team then spent the year rewriting the distance book in it: 12:51 for 5 km on the roads of Monaco on 16 February, a world record; 12:35.36 for 5000 m on the Monaco track on 14 August, a world record; and 26:11.00 for 10,000 m in Valencia on 7 October, the same night his team-mate Letesenbet Gidey ran 14:06.62 for 5000 m. Both track records still stand in September 2026. In between, on 4 September in Brussels, Sifan Hassan — Nike, no team — ran 18,930 metres in one hour, a world record that also still stands.

2021 had the marathon and the 10,000. Eliud Kipchoge had lost in London in October 2020 — eighth, 2:06:49, his first defeat since 2013 — and answered on 18 April 2021 with 2:04:30 at the NN Mission Marathon in Enschede, a race his own team built on an airfield so that he could run one. In June the 10,000 m record changed hands twice on the same track: Hassan's 29:06.82 in Hengelo on the 6th, Gidey's 29:01.03 there on the 8th. Faith Kipyegon ran a Kenyan record 3:51.07 for 1500 m in Monaco on 9 July and won the Diamond League final in Zürich in September.

One American mark of the cycle needs its footnote. At a Bowerman Track Club time trial in Portland in July 2020, Shelby Houlihan ran 14:23.92 for 5000 m, an American record; in June 2021 she was banned for four years after a positive test for nandrolone, a decision the Court of Arbitration for Sport upheld. The record stands in the book; the ban is part of its provenance.

The postponed Tokyo Games of August 2021 were raced in federation kit — Team USA in the Nike kit of USATF, Kenya in the Nike kit of Athletics Kenya — and belong to our country pages, not to this one.

The Kit of the Cycle

The Tokyo generation is shattered-glass geometry: royal blue broken by mint-green and sky-blue shard prints across the crops and singlets, with ribbed royal briefs and a plain royal windbreaker over the racing layer. Because the Games moved a year, this cycle was issued and worn across two seasons — kit stamped 2020/2021 is the tell.

Construction follows the athlete-issue rules our authentication guide covers: competition-weight cloth, race cuts, no retail run. “Pro Elite” is the athlete-channel label collectors use — the programme Nike itself keeps off the shelves. Federation kit is a different contract: what USATF or Athletics Kenya wear at a Worlds lives in our country pages, not here.

From this cycle · in the archiveNike Pro Elite 2020/2021 Women Distance SingletRace-issue from the double-year cycle — the shard-print generation stamped 2020/2021 because the season moved.150,00 €View piece →

The Full Cycle in the Archive

Every piece we hold from the 2020/21 cycle, grouped by edition — in-stock first, sold pieces dimmed and documented, refreshed against live stock. The full brand story is in the Nike pillar.

Nike Pro Elite Team 2020/2021 Women Running Shorts120,00 €View Piece →Nike Pro Elite 2021 Women Competition Briefs120,00 €View Piece →Nike Pro Elite 2020/2021 Women Distance Crop Top120,00 €View Piece →Nike Pro Elite 2020/2021 Women Distance Singlet150,00 €View Piece →Nike Pro Elite 2020/2021 Lightweight JacketSold out · check back soonView Piece →