EXCLUSIVE: Trailblazing Snowboarder Barrett Christy on Having Nike ACG's Only Signature Sneakers Ever

On a recent doomscroll, I was stopped in my tracks (as usual) by the Eastbay Archive account. I believe the curator of the account’s name is Drew, which is objectively a fantastic name, and he does a really good job of curating pages from old Eastbay catalogs to scan them into the future. It’s a great way for today’s sneakerheads to do double-takes and recoil in shock when they see Jordan retros used to be under a hundred bucks.

But this time, I wasn’t struck by reverse sticker shock, or mesmerized by the shiny chrome rim on some DaDa Spinners. Happens more than I’d like to admit. No, this time, I stared for what seemed like forever at a page of unearthed ACG sneakers, in awe at the sheer volume of different silhouettes the Nike sublabel was producing at the time. I remember the same ones you remember, from the Mowabbs and Terras to the Madas and Baltoros. Certain ACG silhouettes transcended the trail and became bona fide street sensations. But the rest? Forgotten in time.

We’re currently in the middle of another ACG reboot at Nike, and it’s pretty good so far, but let’s see what else is coming before we declare it a monumental success. Because the old ACG? Peak. Vibrant oranges, electric blues, bold yellows, and that purple… I mean, c’mon. The color schemes, the edgy branding, the shoes that gave you the confidence to tackle whatever obstacle was in front of you.

Nike’s ACG division has experienced the highest of highs and some forgettable lows, but when it’s good, it’s really good. Like, one of the best tools Nike has on its belt. Earlier this year, Nike used one of the largest branding platforms in the world, the Olympics, to launch ACG’s latest iteration. It was a risky play, as the gear athletes wear throughout the ceremonies and games is highly coveted real estate seen by an enormous audience. But Nike pushed all their chips in on ACG, forgoing Swoosh branding for the far less widely recognizable ACG triangle logo across the entire Team USA collection.

Some pieces felt very wild west Americana, some gave moon landing vibes, but together, they showed everyone the future of sportswear tech. The pièce de résistance was the adaptive Air Milano jacket, which provides athletes the ability to adjust their warmth levels by inflating and deflating embedded Nike Air units that can turn the windbreaker hoodie into a puffer jacket before your chairlift gets to the top of the mountain. Nike went all-out, even painting a real-life train ACG Orange to take athletes from Milan to the snow-capped Alps.

Alright hold on, I’m talking about trains. Let’s get this back on track. The Eastbay ACG retrospective.

This throwback post was a goldmine of incredible silhouettes I either forgot existed or had never seen before, filled with kicks that need to be retro’d like yesterday. An Air Terra Humada in a head-turning spice and charcoal colorway that would sell out instantly right now, a Kiona that would fit in perfectly with today’s mesh-dominant landscape, and two colorways of a shimmering shoe I had no clue existed before this very moment.

They were placed next to an action shot of a snowboarder named Barrett Christy pulling a massive stalefish mid-air somewhere in the deep pow, listed as the Nike ACG Air Barrett Christy. I was taken aback because I never knew ACG had done a signature sneaker for an athlete, let alone a snowboarder, let alone one that was a woman. This felt like a major moment that should have been a talking point while ACG took center stage at the Winter Olympics. I certainly remembered Barrett Christy, especially after a quick Google search brought up her appearances on the cover of Apple Jacks and Pop-Tarts boxes. Those I definitely had. But this shoe was a revelation, and it sent me down a rabbit hole.

This Eastbay page had a Limestone and Alabaster pair of the shimmery mesh and synthetic leather trail-ready shoe displayed, as well as a black and dandelion variant. They were described as “Snowboard champion Barrett Christy’s signature shoe” and came in women’s sizing at a cost of $69.99. An absolute steal. Or a train heist, if you will.

As I scoured the internet for more information about this long-lost All Conditions Gem, I faced challenges along the way. Roadblocks like sites that used to have stories about them being deactivated, old social posts archived, magazines dead. This rocky terrain was the exact situation I needed a pair of Barretts for. Thankfully, the legend herself appeared on an episode of the leading snowboarding podcast, The Bomb Hole, and they talked at length about Christy’s time at Nike and her contributions to the sport overall. The three-plus-hour listen was a treasure trove of nuggets I needed to complete the puzzle of these sneakers.

As women take over the signature sneaker world, even having some of the most worn shoes in the NBA, it’s more important than ever to know where it all started. In 1995, Sheryl Swoopes became the first women’s basketball player with a signature sneaker at Nike, the Air Swoopes. You know who the second woman with a signature shoe at Nike was? Not Lisa Leslie, not Dawn Staley, not Diana Taurasi. Nope, it was Barrett Christy.

One of the most decorated medalists in X-Games history and a member of the first-ever Team USA Olympic snowboarding team in Nagano, Christy is a pioneer in the sport, pushing it forward into the mainstream during its relative infancy. She was a star, and Nike knew it. First, before she became a signature athlete for the Swoosh, Nike asked her to help consult on their foray into making snowboard gear like ACG boots and other tech outerwear. Then, as the relationship evolved and Christy became more of a household name in the sport, she got the opportunity to work on her own shoe.

There were more colorways, insane commercials, and – get this – a second shoe that was even better than the first. Turns out, not every signature sneaker line needs to have a sophomore slump. After all of my digging and learning everything I could about these shoes, there was only one thing left to do: go straight to the source.

DREW LONDON: So, this all came about because we’ve been excited for the upcoming WNBA season and all of the new signature sneakers coming. We have Caitlin Clark’s sneaker on the way, A’ja Wilson's second sneaker out now, etc. So, we’ve been putting together a retrospective of the entire lineage, going back into the archives, and finding all of these older signature sneakers people may have forgotten about. Shout out to this great Instagram account that just does Eastbay archives, I was going through one of them and he did a whole thing on ACG stuff and I saw your photo. I'm like, ‘Oh my god, I didn't know Barrett Christy had a sneaker.’ And it's a really cool sneaker. So I screenshot it and send it to the rest of my team to see if they knew about it. We didn't even know ACG had done signature sneakers for individual athletes.

BARRETT CHRISTY CUMMINS: I should have done some digging because I have them! I've got them up in the garage and I agree, they're cool again! For a while I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, these things are so bad.’ But I feel like they're cool again because that style has come back.

DL: They're the coolest! I love ACG , my wife and I have matching Mowabbs from when they retro’d them a couple of years ago that we take our dogs hiking in. They’re always the best color schemes. But the brand has kind of died and been reborn a few times, so there are lots of hidden gems out there.

BCC: A few times, yeah. [Laughs]

DL: So when I saw your shoe and then the second one, I was so excited. I was like, ‘Okay, I have to find Barrett and see if she'd be willing to talk about these.’

BCC: I'm so glad you did. I was looking for a flyer my agent made for the launch of the shoe. Maybe it was even the second year of the shoe and they did some cool promotions. I'm sorry I didn't dig before.

DL: The one with the three colorways of the sneaker? And a couple photos of you?

BCC: Yeah!

DL: I found it!

BCC: They did a bunch of weird one-off colorways, which Nike does when they're trying to figure out what colors are going to hit. And they gave me the whole remaining inventory of that shoe when they discontinued it and I donated them all to the Women's Sports Foundation. It was like 500 pairs or something. I kept some in varied sizes and I may have kept a couple odd colorways, although I don't think there's much left now. But yeah, the slip-on one (the BC2) was the good one. The other ones were heavy, like big Lugz souls and narrow.

DL: I couldn’t tell, some of ACG's shoes are heavier and meant for the trail and some of them are lighter and more mesh.

BCC: The first one was kind of heavy, narrow toebox. It reminded me of a climbing shoe, you know? It just didn't flex really nicely, but the slip on was so good.

DL: The second one is sick.

BCC: I mean, I'd wear them now.

DL: How many colorways were there at launch?

BCC: A navy blue and yellow, the tan, there was a black and red one. Those are the ones I remember. But there may be another one. I couldn't even tell you how many colorways of the first one. I think we did a lot of experimenting with that before it launched. I don't think ACG ever did another pro model shoe?

DL: They haven’t. First and second time were both you. Legendary.

BCC: The fact that they did it with a woman was pretty cool. Andrea Corradini was doing all this before she rose up the ranks at Nike. I worked with her on the footwear design. I think before that, the only other female signature shoe at Nike was Lisa Leslie, right?

DL: It was Sheryl Swoopes, I just looked that up before talking with you to double-check. Lisa Leslie had one shortly after, and then Dawn Staley as well. All basketball players, though, so to be in that company is very cool for a snowboarder.

BCC: I know, it's cool. Still, I can't even get shit from Nike anymore. [Laughs] I gotta buy it. All of my Nike friends are gone. I still get an employee code from one friend, but everybody else has moved on. James Arizumi, do you know him? He was not ACG back then, but he actually did end up doing one of the ACG rebrands in the last five or six years. He was in charge of ACG, but then that fell apart and he went back to Jordan or golf or something. But in between, he was at Nike SB. So that's where I got to know him. You want the backstory? You want the timeline?

DL: I'm fascinated by it.

BCC: I'm excited to talk about this! I get on a lot of calls throughout the day, but this one is way more exciting than my kid’s thesis project that I'm talking about. [Laughs] Nike approached me in 1997 before the Olympics like, ‘You should come ride for us. We're going to do this whole snowboard program at ACG.’ I was skeptical. I had other sponsors and didn't want to be a sellout, but at the same time, it's Nike.

DL: It’s Nike.

BCC: I felt good about it and signed with them before the Olympics. I didn't end up doing that well at the Olympics, which would have, I think in my mind, like Nike and Olympics combo would have been life changing, but they stuck with me. ACG was actually more interested in the mountain culture and we went on heli trips and stuff. They sponsored the Warren Miller films so I got to get in with them and do some really cool stuff. They did a ‘What are you training for?’ campaign around 1998 or ‘99, that was an amazing experience. I wore them head to toe, so there was some conflict between Jordan and Oakley and nobody could have Oakley on their head if they were going to be featured in Nike stuff, so they got me out of an Oakley contract so I could ride head-to-toe Nike. But then they didn't ever make good goggles or sunglasses. They were all pretty wacky. So, I ended that Oakley deal kind of prematurely.

DL: Was it just ACG that was doing snowboarding? Because I remember there were Nike boots and boards at one point.

BCC: Yeah, that was later. That was at the end when Nike SB got into snowboarding and started making boots. But they actually did make an ACG boot that I don't think ever hit the market. They licensed snowboards too and they were really crappy. But the boots were awful. And I know they put a lot of work into them and they looked like an ACG shoe, but they were terribly uncomfortable. I think I've got a pair. You want me to get it? Like I think they’re in the garage hanging up.

DL: Yes, please! That’s amazing.

BCC: Okay, hold on. [Barrett tears apart the garage looking for long lost treasures, I fill up my water bottle.] All right, found them. They're pretty bad. Not long after, ACG decided they weren't going to do snowboarding anymore. Nike kept me on in women's, so I got to be a women's training athlete. They had just launched these Nike Goddess stores that featured all women's products and they did a tour, so I was along for the ride for some fun stuff and I'm grateful they kept me on to be involved as an athlete.

Then, I think I had my first kid and I never really left but kind of transitioned into consulting because they were starting Nike SB… or actually Nike 6.0 came around first and that's what they gave me an opportunity to get involved with. I came on as a mentor, we had snowboard mentors, skateboard mentors, BMX, etc. I was basically a team manager but I wasn't an employee and didn't have to deal with the internal bullshit. Just got to come up with cool ideas and take the kids on trips and do things that supported the brand. When Nike SB brought snowboarding into the fold, I stayed involved and got to consult on the snow team and the product and all of that. So it was a good run. I won't get into some of the drama in between, but I was grateful for the people that were there and kept my foot in the door. Now I don't have any feet in the door, but I'm still a fan of Nike and I still can't wear any other crappy shoes.

DL: What an amazing run, and there's not enough coverage of it online. Finding info about your shoes and work for Nike has been difficult. I'm hopeful that shining a light on it with a new story will have people looking for it and learning about your story all over again.

BCC: They've come back and they have an archive room at Nike now. They did something that was probably like six or eight years ago now, and I went down and they did have a display in there, not just of me, but of their progression of women's models. It was cool to be a part of that and see the shoe as a part of that.

DL: It's really interesting to hear about this earlier iteration of ACG and it seems like it was operating almost as its own thing a little bit outside of Nike. In contrast to today where this newest iteration of ACG that just rolled out for the Winter Olympics, it seems like it's one of their primary focuses and all of their biggest collaborators are doing ACG products and collabs.

BCC: Scott McKern was the one who brought me in, I know he stayed at Nike doing a variety of other things for a while. These people were really early in their careers and it did feel kind of like they had their own team. They had their own program. They were trying to prove the concept that action sports was a thing worth investing in. So, I don't think they nailed their identity in snowboarding because they had extreme backcountry riders, they had me, they had some other people. All good riders, but there wasn't a cohesive team. I mean, we all had fun together and we did get to film and do some cool trips together, but it didn't feel cohesive in identifying who ACG was to the snowboarding market. So I wasn't too surprised that ACG exited snowboarding and I got let out of my contract before it was over, and if I'm being completely honest, it had a little something to do with me being pregnant. But it was saved by the people that I was close with, which turned into a blessing because I was able to go into Nike Women's and be a sports model for their women's program and then ride it out until SB came along.

DL: Do your kids raid your Nike archive?

BCC: I don't throw a lot of stuff out. Our garage is a massive museum, and my kids have grown up wearing all of our old t-shirts and sweatshirts. My son's a pro snowboarder now, so he's the only one that gets free stuff delivered anymore. So now I steal from him. Actually, this is his sweater, I shrunk it by mistake.

DL: What did it feel like when Nike offered you your own shoe? And then a second one? Did they come to you with a finished product and say, ‘Are you cool with this?’ Or was it a whole design process where you had certain features you wanted built in?

BCC: It was amazing, I was so stoked. I was older than a lot of my peers because I didn't start snowboarding until I was 19. So I was already in my 20s. I already knew the alternative, working shitty jobs and not making any money and living on a couch and when I had the opportunity to make money and be branded as a Nike athlete, it was a no-brainer. As far as the actual process, they had concepts. They did not come to me with a finished product, but they knew where they wanted it to fit in the line to represent the lifestyle and the training and the Rocky Mountain living kind of look. But I did get to be involved in that process. In fact, the little BC logo, I drew that. I was really into the balance of the elements and yin and yang. It’s on the back of the second shoe.

DL: The logo is so sick, and a slip-on makes so much sense. When I think about snowboarding, after a long day of riding and you take your boots off, the last thing I want to do is tie more laces up on my feet.

BCC: I know, I wish I could have done an after-boot or something. But yeah, I grew up in other sports so obviously having Nike on me felt like it elevated not just me but the sport at the time because snowboarding was still for dirtbags and still was trying to muscle its way into the mainstream in terms of recognition, acknowledgment, sales, all of it. The timing was really good and I just wanted to be a part of it.

DL: Being validated by one of the biggest brands on Earth. Sometimes it's hard to see yourself as the top of your craft, but that helps.

BCC: Yeah, it did.

DL: Most Nike athletes are basketball and baseball and football players, so to represent women in one of the smaller sports on that level, you really blazed a trail for today’s riders. We recently interviewed Zeb Powell, who’s the first snowboarder on Jordan Brand.

BCC: Thank you very much for saying that. I'm stoked for him!

DL: No, thank you!

This interview was edited for length because Barrett and I talked for like another hour and you have a short attention span. But you can still cop Barrett Christy’s iconic pro model snowboard from Gnu. It’s the longest running women’s pro model board in the industry, and a portion of proceeds from the board go directly to Boarding for Breast Cancer to support youth focused education, health and wellness programs.

You will also soon be able to watch Wayward, a documentary Barrett worked on with other pioneering women in snowboarding, with some help from the likes of Burton, Woodward, Yeti, and Sunbum. Check out the trailer and be on the lookout for a release date and streaming info soon.

Drew London

Drew oversees content at Sole Retriever and hates writing in the 3rd person soooo I'm going to stop. I've written for countless blogs and magazines, from Complex to XXL and everywhere in between. Spent a long time in LA, running content and working on branded collabs at The Hundreds. Now, I'm back home on the East Coast freezing my ass off. Email me at drew@soleretriever.com with scoops, story ideas, and size 13 heat.