she is widely considered one of the greatest athletes of the 21st century. off the track, felix is a celebrated entrepreneur and a fierce advocate for maternal rights after her own experience of maternal care in the health system and bruising encounters with sponsors. bbc 100 women met allyson here at the sports campus named after her in the university of southern california, where she studied, to talk about how we can make women athletes�* lives better, the challenges of combining motherhood and elite sport, and the changes she wants to bring about in her retirement years ahead. welcome to 100 women in conversation. thank you for being here. thank you for having me.

well, we are at the university of southern california, where you studied, and we are overlooking the track and field which is named after you. one of the sporting facilities in your name. how does that feel? oh, it's still such a strange feeling. i mean, i remember being here as a student and spending so much time here. never in my wildest dreams would i have imagined that this field would be named after me. i feel so honoured. well, indeed. i mean, you're here, you're on the bbc 100 women list because of your incredible sporting achievements. you're the most awarded american track and field athlete, with 11 olympic medals, 20 world championships. but that's notjust the only bit. yourjourney has then gone on, and i want to talk about that journey. i want to understand that, when you started back in 2004, in athens, yourfirst silver medal in 200m, at that time, what was driving you? at that time it was all about the competition.

you know, i was a teenager and i was so excited. everything was brand—new and i wanted to, you know, achieve greatness. um, i was reallyjust striving after it. you know, i was learning, i was learning so much about the sport and how to compete away from home. i think that was really the moment that the fire was lit, and i knew that it was going to take a lot more to reach my goals. but that's where it all started. and the fire kept burning. and all the way, if we fast forward to tokyo 2020, when you came back to the track as a mother, what was driving you then? because i think it was more than what you just described. yes. at that point, everything had changed for me. i think i finally understood that my purpose was so much bigger than just running fast and just getting medals. and so, when i arrived in tokyo, being a mother and overcoming so much adversity, it was full circle, you know. i knew that my daughter was watching.

i knew the hardship i had been through with my sponsor. and i was showing up and competing in shoes from a company that i had built. i really had evolved from that athlete that showed up just trying to run fast. and your daughter camryn was born in 2018. i mean, the first pregnancy is a lot ofjoy, it's a lot of anticipation, but as you just alluded, it was a very difficult time for you. you're probably under a lot of pressure. where do you think that pressure was coming from? yeah, it wasn't what i had imagined. i had always dreamt... i knew i wanted to be a mother, and i dreamt of, you know, like everyone usually does, of a really happy situation. and i was having a very difficult time, you know, with my sponsor and trying to renegotiate. that wasn't going well so there was pressure there. i didn't know how that

would end, if we would come to terms or not. and then the birth of my daughter was very traumatic, and that was a huge hardship that i didn't see coming. and so dealing with both of those things simultaneously, it was a really dark situation. in 2019, felix wrote an opinion piece for the new york times that called out her former sponsor for not providing guaranteed protections for pregnant athletes and new mums. it was titled... one of the lay points that felix fought for was a contractual guarantee that athletes wouldn't be punished if their performance dropped in the months surrounding childbirth. i want protection around maternity. i want that to change. i know that it's been said, but i want to see change. i am in this process right now. i am under negotiations. i want to be able to sign

a contract that says there is maternity rights. the reaction to it was immediate and led to nike totally rewriting their maternity contracts for all their female athletes. the new contracts guaranteed an athlete's pay and bonuses for 18 months around pregnancy. you did call out your sponsor in 2019, in an op—ed that you wrote for the new york times. you revealed that you had asked them to guarantee them not to punish you if you weren't at your best performance right after childbirth, and that they had declined at that moment. how hard was it to come out public with that information? it was extremely difficult. you know, they said that they would give me time to recoverfrom pregnancy, but they weren't willing to set that precedent for all female athletes. i think because ijust went through the situation i did with my daughter, itjust felt unacceptable to me that i would let her generation

take on this fight. and so that's really where that push and that courage came from to speak out, because i've always been an athlete that's been very private and i haven't spoken out at the time about anything. and so this was so outside of my comfort zone, but it was that important. were you scared at any point? i was terrified. i was terrified what the consequences would be. i was terrified in how it would be received. itjust wasn't in my nature. so it was really difficult to be able to just be vulnerable. and at that time, you said that you felt the sports industry was run by men for men, that it was discriminatory. has that changed in the five years since? i think there's been a lot of progress since that time. i think about when i went through that and all of the negotiations, i was dealing with a team of all men, who were basically telling me how i would come

back from childbirth. i think that now there are more women who have seats at the table and have power, but we still have a long way to go. i think that we have momentum, but real change, you know, sometimes it takes a long time. and now you also have a seat at the table. you're one of the four members of the international olympic committee's athletes�* commission. what powers does that give you? myjob will be to listen to the athletes and hear what they're going through, what they need, and be a representation from them, and really to bring new energy to the commission. 0bviously, i'm just starting out, but i want to represent the athletes well. and what is the blue—sky thinking on that? what is the one thing you'd like to move in your time there? and you have eight years. i think, in my experience, i can bring a lot to the table regarding female athletes and regarding equality and representation there. and so i think that's my strong

suit and i really want to have an impact there. in paris, we were able to have the nursery for the first time. yes, incredible. a family space for athletes for the first time ever at an olympic games. i consider that a huge win and i want to build off of that. but ideas like that, you know, not going the traditional route. just because things have always been one way, we don't have to stay in that box. so maternal health is clearly your passion area. have you heard anything else from athletes you've been able to speak to up until now, after taking this responsibility? i've heard, you know, a lot of feedback from the nursery, how we can continue to grow that. i think when it comes to female athletes, i think starting a family is a point that is very personal. but i think a lot of athletes

have feelings on that so i have some ideas around that as well. i'll continue to listen and see how we can help. care to share some of those ideas? i think we're just on the early stages of thinking through things, but i will share from my own experience. i know, with my second pregnancy, just dealing with fertility issues, i had an ivf pregnancy. i would like to support athletes who go through a journey like that. just hearing from them, different ideas around that, and kind of diving into that space. it is a difficult period when you are an active sports person and it was for you. what would your advice be to any female athlete considering motherhood, or someone who's just stepped into it, about coming back to the sport? my encouragement would be go with what your heart's desire is. if it is your decision to have a child in the midst of your career, then do that.

we're working really hard to support women who make that choice, and i don't think that you should have to put it off. if you want to put it off, and it's something that you see down the line, then do that. and if it's not your choice to be a mother at all, do that. so i think it's being able to have the power to make those decisions yourself in your own timing. that's what it's all about. and making sure that the systems are in place will support that. and apart from sponsorship support, which is what you had to fight, what else would an athlete who's stepping away to become a mother and then coming back on the track, what other support can sports bodies like the ioc offer? one thing that i'm really interested in is around childcare. that's a huge barrier to be able to re—enter the sport and figure out travelling the world and who is caring for your child. so i'm interested to figure out better ways to do more work

around that as well, because it's hard enough as a woman who has had a child to come back. you know, it's hard mentally, it's hard physically. so many things. so to be able to take something off of that plate is what i look to do. is gender pay parity an issue that you feel you'd want to work on, and what kind of difference do you think you could make in that? that is something that i'm really interested in, and it's something that i feel can continue to improve. at the olympics, i felt like it was a job well done to get to this place, but there's still more to do. more work to do and more representation. and so i definitely hope to do work on that as well. i just want to talk about something that was a really sad development and a story that shocked the whole world earlier this year. when your fellow 0lympian, rebecca cheptegei, was set on fire by a former partner and died. yeah. when you heard of that,

what went through your mind? just devastation. i mean, i think it's just so awful, you know, that a woman so accomplished, so celebrated... it's horrible for anybody to be subjected to something like that. but this day and age, i thought it was just a horrific, horrific event. so horrifying. compared to men especially, women athletes do seem to be more vulnerable to violence and abuse, as various studies have suggested. what do you think can fix that situation or improve it and have a wider impact? mm. i definitely don't have the answer of what can improve it or how we can fix it, but it is such a real problem. i think as sports people who have a platform and who are role models,

you know, i think that that is something that we can control. the messages that we put out and that this is just unacceptable for anyone. you know, i think that's an area that we can really take ownership in. this year, felix worked with the olympics committee to introduce a nursery to the olympic village at the 2024 paris 0lympics for the first time. i think it really tells women that you can choose motherhood and also be at the top of your game. it is a part of a series of efforts felix hopes to make on improving maternal health care in the industry and at home. this year, she was also awarded a $20 million grant from the gates foundation to improve maternal health outcomes for black mothers in the us. it was an issue she took up following the death of her team—mate, tori bowie, who died from postpartum complications, as well as her

own experience of a premature birth of a baby daughter in 2018. felix took her cause to the us congress, where she highlighted the rate of maternal mortality amongst black women. the next month was spent in the nicu, and i learned that my story was not so uncommon. there were others like me, just like me, black like me, healthy like me, doing their best, just like me. and they faced death like me too. i have decided to further lend my voice to organisations who have taken up this work, and i hope that i can not only share my story, but be intimately involved in this work and fight to make a difference. i wanted to talk about your pregnancy, which you alluded to was a very difficult time. it was life threatening. you've been so vocal about it and you shared your story. you went to the us congress to raise awareness about maternal mortality. and what you said there, and i quote, you said, "a level of racial bias exists

within our health care system. "that is troubling and will be difficult to tackle but that doesn't mean we shouldn't." have things changed since you said that? not enough. you know, it's still a problem that continues for women of colour. there's still an implicit bias in our health care system, and we're not seeing the numbers change quick enough. and so a lot of the things that i spoke about in front of congress are still issues today, and we have a lot more work to do. what do you think is the biggest support that is lacking that women of colour especially need when it comes to maternal health? when i talk to many women, one of the things that i always hear is that they are not being heard. when you're in a doctor's office and you are saying that, "i think something is wrong." being dismissed, not

being believed, that is a huge problem. the statistics says 80% of the complications in deaths that women of colour go through regarding pregnancy are preventable. and i'm alwaysjust shocked by that number. you know, it's staggering. but it also is very hopeful because that is something that can turn around, but it's not going to turn around if we're not educating our medical professionals, if we're not doing something to combat these problems. and so, real work and real changes need to be made. is there something specific that you think the government can do to address this? i think that, you know, putting money into research — that needs to be done. there is policy changes. the momnibus act still has not fully passed. and so making sure that things like that are taking place so that we can have the resources that we need to continue down this path to have better outcomes. we're discussing maternal health so we do need to talk about the right to abortion as well. what are your thoughts on that?

i think that women should have their rights. there is so much that has to do with your well being, you know, decisions that are being made, and so, yeah, i think fully that we should be able to own our own decisions and choices. do you think about that when you think about your daughter's future, whether she will have that right? how difficult it's going to be going forward? yeah. any time i think about women's rights in general, i think about the next generation and i think having a daughter makes it very personal. a lot of the issues that i tackle, i have that personal connection and calling. and so i do — i think about her and her generation and the things that they might be without. do you worry?

i'm concerned, you know, as a parent, and as we have seen so many things change in the world, it is a scary time. and so i think about, you know, what she might endure, her generation, and i think it's the motivation to work so hard now, to try to combat that. this has been a very important happy year for you with the birth of your second child, trey. congratulations. thank you. and on the professionalfront, you have got this big grant, $20 million grant by melinda french gates, who's a philanthropist but also a 100 women alumni, to work on the issue that you're so passionate about — maternal health. have you thought about how you're going to use that money? i have. i'm so grateful for melinda's commitment to women's health. and in this phase of her life,

what she's doing around that is really monumental. i've decided to focus in on maternal health, on black maternal health, and really on organisations who are doing important work within their own communities and really touching women who are most at risk and who are, you know, doing urgent work to come out with better outcomes. it's really been very interesting to learn the landscape better, to hear what's happening in different parts of the world and to try to support those organisations. so would that work be centred in the united states or in different countries, maybe the continent of africa or other developing nations? yeah, it's open globally. and so, obviously, i have my most experience in the states and in my own communities, but i am actively speaking to organisations all over the world. and so, this is an issue

all over the world as well so i'm excited to learn more. you also co—founded a sports management firm recently, adding to the list of your achievements as an entrepreneur now. how much are you hoping to change in the way women athletes are represented through this venture? i'm very hopeful. ifeel like i have learned so much through my own career, and i think about this management firm, always alpha, as part of my legacy. you know, how i will pass that knowledge down. it's the first firm that is fully focused on women and i think that's a very important thing. it's much needed in this world. i think women shouldn't be an afterthought, especially as we think about their business and how that strategy is created. and so i'm really excited to hopefully have an impact on the women who are involved in sports. how is that strategy different?

i'm curious. i think i look at historically how men have been represented, the sponsors that they've had. traditionally, i think women have been put in the same box, you know, the same sponsors from 20, 30 years ago — we're seeing that continue on. i think we need new players. we need brands that are focused specifically on women, whether it's a beauty brand or something where women are at the forefront. itjust makes sense. that's how it should be. and so excited to try to shift that a bit. and the theme for bbc 100 women this year is resilience. you tie in with that so nicely! we want to celebrate women for the resilience they've showed in their personal lives and their daily lives in the face of adversity. what does resilience mean to you? you know, to me, it's learning

how to navigate really difficult situations and continue through. you know, not accepting "no." not accepting the way things have always been done, finding a new path and forging forward. you graduated from here in 2007, 17 years back. do you have a favourite memory of that time? i really enjoy thinking about my time here with my brother, who also went here. i would come out to the stadium sometimes and just do work in between classes. and so fond memories just being here and studying and being with my brother. so what is harder, being a mother or an athlete? they both have their challenges but being a mother, it's so unpredictable. there are so many challenges.

it wears on your heart a lot. and so i would say that that's probably the tougher one. is your daughter interested in sport and athletics in particular? she is athletic. i see it coming. but right now, she's doing a little bit of everything. tennis and swimming and just, you know, being a kid playing. are there specific challenges you think she will have to face as a woman of colour when she grows up? i mean, growing up as a woman of colour in this world, of course, she'll have hardships, she'll have difficulties. and i want to give her the tools to be able to navigate those challenges. as a mom, of course, i worry about those things, but i will have to make sure that i instil in her character, integrity, and that she'll be able to have the strength to get through those difficulties. what kind of conversation do you think you're going to have with your son, given you're such a fierce advocate of women's rights? yeah, i'm excited that i have a son now, that i can talk to him

about being an ally. you know, it's so important for me. my brother is a huge ally in my life, and i want to talk to him about that, about how you treat women and how he will grow up to be a feminist as well. and so, those things, they really make me happy. do you think we have enough feminist men in this world? of course not. we can always use more. and i'm excited to raise him to know that he can be a part of solutions. that he can be a help and that he can be proud to be a feminist as well. i really want to leave things better than i found them and i get excited about creating change and doing things differently. i don't feel too much of an added burden because of that. ifind morejoy in knowing that, for my kids, i hope that they won't face all the same challenges that idid. thank you.

hello there. we've got more strong winds, heavy rain and some snow as we head into the new year. the heavy rain has moved away from scotland, but it's moved further south, and it's across this part of northwest england that we have an amber rain warning from the met 0ffice. 100mm of rain in the hills — likely to be flooding and travel disruption. there's our band of rain in the morning. and on the rain end, particularly south of it,

some very gusty winds arriving, particularly so in the southwest and coastal areas. north of the rain band the winds won't be as strong, but it's getting colder. there'll be some snow and ice to start the day in northern scotland. through the morning this heavy rain and squally winds will push down into southern england. then things calm down for a while. another band of rain and hill snow moves southwards across scotland towards northern ireland, later into northern england. sunshine and snow showers continue in northern scotland and we're getting a northerly wind. it's not going to be as strong as the southwesterly wind ahead of the rain, but it is going to be introducing colder air. last of any mild areas across southernmost parts of england. but it'll be a wet end to the day. that weather front does clear away. and then we introduce this arctic air right the way across the whole of the country. temperatures will be dropping. a widespread frost for thursday morning. could be some icy patches following any overnight showers as well. most of the snow showers on thursday are going to be across northern scotland. a few wintry showers for northern ireland, near the west coast of wales, more especially along some of these north sea coasts, but for large parts of the country it's going to be dry and sunny. certainly going to feel a lot colder everywhere, but away from those north sea coasts at least the winds

are not going to be particularly strong. but we're going to stay in that colder air as we head towards the end of the week. and there'll be some more snow showers across the north and northeast of scotland. a few more wintry showers for northern ireland, perhaps towards the north wales, and a few showers getting close to those north sea coasts. but again, many places on friday will be dry and sunny. and again it's cold — temperatures in scotland struggling to get above freezing. things could get very interesting later in the weekend. this low pressure threatening to bring some wet weather into the cold air on sunday. but ahead of that on saturday, that weather front across the north may well bring some rain, sleet and snow to scotland. one or two wintry showers further south. some patches of fog for northern parts of the uk. the winds are going to be quite light. it is going to feel cold as we head into the weekend. again, highs of only around three to five celsius.

live from singapore, this is bbc news. new year's celebrations continue across the world, with new york just continue across the world, with new yorkjust one hour away from midnight. south korea says initial data has been extracted from the voice recorder of the jeju has been extracted from the voice recorder of thejeju air plane that crashed on sunday, killing 179 people.

crowds of supporters and opponents gather outside president yoon seok—youl�*s home in south korea. investigators insist they'll execute an arrest warrant against the former president before the january six deadline. welcome to news day. happy new year, wherever you're tuning in from. it's midday here in singapore on the first day of 2025, but there's still new year's celebrations gearing up and winding down. parts of eastern canada and south and central america are welcoming in the new year. first, let's take a quick look at the rest of the world and how they ushered in the new year. the world welcomes 2025, fire

workers from the top of