Why Do Men's Football Players Wear Sports Bras During Games?

If you're watching Euro 2024 at the moment or have been keeping up with the Premier League, you may have noticed some men's football players wearing an unusual accessory under their shirts. When players remove their shirts at the end of the game, some are wearing what looks like a sports bra underneath.

Perhaps you saw it when Kevin Csoboth of Hungary removed his shirt to celebrate the team's last minute victory over Scotland on Sunday.

Men's football players have been wearing these sports-bra-like harnesses for the last few years, as it turns out, but many viewers not used to watching the game are getting their first look at them and are (understandably) a bit confused. So what actually is the "sports bra" under the shirts of male footballers?

It's not there for pec support or to prevent chafing (although, hey, maybe it helps?). The "sports bras" worn by men's football players are actually GPS tracker vests. Each vest has a tracker in the back that provides a load of data for coaches, trainers, and players to learn from. According to Catapult Sports, which sells them, GPS vests can measure how much and how hard the players are working, including things like "total distance, top speed, number of sprints, sprint distance, power, load, [and] intensity".

In other words, after a tough match or practice, the coaching staff can immediately find out how much effort their players exerted and tailor subsequent training sessions accordingly or tweak their recommendations for recovery. It can also provide interesting nuggets of info for fans, such as the fact that Polish striker Robert Lewandowski recorded the highest average distance walked during the group stage of the 2022 World Cup, just edging out Messi, according to FIFA data via The Athletic.

These might just be fun facts to most of us, but they're also useful pieces of information for coaching staff. This data can help coaches get their players back into good condition for their next match or craft a better plan to secure victory — and the sports-bra-like GPS vests are what provide the insights.

That all makes sense, but why go with a vest instead of a wrist tracker like a fitness watch? According to Catapult Sports, it's for accuracy and safety. "The vest holds the pod in the optimal position for tracking so it can reach the GPS satellites," the brand explains. "This makes sure the data is as accurate and reliable as possible." That placement is also "proven" to be the safest location for athletes playing highly physical sports like football, the brand adds.

Maggie Ryan was an assistant editor at PS. A longtime runner and athlete, Maggie has nearly four years of experience covering topics in the wellness space, specialising in fitness, sports, nutrition, and mental health.