Sports Illustrated
2025 SI Swimsuit highlights women athletes in new edition: Nelly Korda, Gabby Thomas and Suni Lee
The 2025 edition of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit will feature a group of talented, strong, and inspiring female athletes.
Sports Illustrated’s 2025 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit edition won’t hit the stands until the spring, but people are already talking about it and looking forward to it after the magazine announced the group of female athletes to be featured. Some teaser photos have even been released already.
The 2025 edition will feature U.S. Olympic gymnast Suni Lee, Olympic track and field sprinter Gabby Thomas, Olympic skier Eileen Gu, and golfing world champion Nelly Korda.
SI Swimsuit’s “powerful female athletes” for 2025
“We are thrilled to launch our shoot season for the 2025 issue with an extraordinary lineup of powerful female athletes,” SI Swimsuit editor-in-chief MJ Day said. “This remarkable group, featuring Olympic medalists, world champions, and record holders, embodies the next generation of all-stars poised to transform the world of sports. They defy stereotypes and champion equality, inspiring young girls to envision themselves as both athletes and leaders. At SI Swimsuit, we’ve always celebrated the future of women, and there’s no better way to honor these remarkable achievements than by featuring them on the pages of our issue."
U.S. Olympic gymnast Suni Lee is just 21 years old and has already won two gold medals (Tokyo 2020 andParis 2024). With one silver and three bronzes on top of that, Lee is one of the most decorated gymnasts in United States history.
Joining Lee in the SI Swimsuit issue is three-time Olympic gold medalist Gabby Thomas. In the 2024 Paris Olympics, 27-year-old Thomas took home gold in the 220m sprint, the 4x100 m relay, and the 4x400m relay plus a bronze in the 200m sprint in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. In addition to running track, Thomas has her degree in neurobiology from Harvard and a Masters of Public Health in epidemiology from the University of Texas and works at the Volunteer Healthcare Clinic in Austin, Texas.
Women’s World No. 1 golfer Nelly Korda, who claimed the LGPA’s Rolex Player of the Year award this week, will also be featured in the 2025 SI Swimsuit edition. Since winning her first LGPA Tour title in 2018, Korda has won a gold medal at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics plus five consecutive tour wins in 2024, just the third female golfer to claim that many back-to-back victories.
Another Olympic athlete joins these three women in the 2025 issue, skiier Eileen Gu, who became a household name in 2022 when she won the gold medal in big air and halfpipe and silver in slopestyle, making her the youngest Olympic champion in freestyle skiing and the first person to win three medals in a single Olympic Games. No stranger to modeling, Gu has appeared on the cover of Vogue China, Elle, and Harper‘s Bazaar. She also studies quantum physics at Stanford University and hopes to inspire young girls and women to pursue their interests with passion.