Pitot Index · Sportswear · Week 43 · 2026

Sportswear

How the machines currently read sportswear.

Every week, 10 sportswear brands are put to the major AI systems and the answers are scored on the same instrument. This is the sector's standing reading — 68.7, band A — and what it means.

See the board All fourteen sectors
PeriodWeek 43 · 2026
Brands tracked10
BandA
Spread5.4 pts
Series14 weeks
InstrumentARES-C 2.3
Sportswear · category average · ARES-C composite 68.7 A +1.0 Week 43 · 2026 · 10 brands · rank 12 of 14

14 weeks · 2026-W30 → 2026-W43

Sportswear · top 10Week 43 · 2026
  1. 1 Nike 75.5 AA
  2. 2 The North Face 73.9 AA
  3. 3 ASICS 73.0 AA
  4. 4 Adidas 72.3 AA
  5. 5 New Balance 70.6 AA
  6. 6 Lululemon 69.4 A
  7. 7 Puma 67.5 A
  8. 8 Columbia Sportswear 66.3 A
  9. 9 Under Armour 60.7 A
  10. 10 Reebok 58.0 A
The reading

What 68.7 means for sportswear

A score is a position. The shape around it is the information.

A sector average tells you what the machines have settled on. The spread tells you whether anyone inside it is winning.

Band A · 55+
Recognised and broadly described without error, with real gaps in differentiation against the competitive set. That places the sector 12 of 14 sectors tracked, 3.9 points below the index average of 72.6.
Movement
The reading is up 1.0 points on the week — a real move, though a single week is not yet a direction. The series behind this page runs to 14 weekly readings, beginning 2026-W30 — long enough that a trend can be separated from a week.
Dispersion
A spread of 5.4 points across the tracked cohort is moderate. There is visible separation between the top and the middle of sportswear, but no brand is running away with the category.
The sector

Why sportswear reads this way

The instrument produces the figure. A person writes the reading.

Observation
Sportswear is defined in the machine record by endorsement and by scrutiny in roughly equal measure. Athlete association, manufacturing conditions and campaign response all carry heavily, and they move together — which is why these brands tend to rise and fall as a group rather than individually.
Sector leader · Week 43 · 2026
Nike leads sportswear at 75.5, band AA — 6.8 points clear of the category average. The full ranked board sits above; the fourteen-sector view is on the Pitot Index.
How this is measured
Readings are produced by ARES-C, a composite instrument that puts a standardised prompt set to nine pinned AI models each week and scores the answers automatically across five dimensions — authority, reputation, expertise visibility, signal consistency and context. We check model versions every cycle and log any change we find, with the date we found it.
  • Same prompts, same cohort, same scoring, every week
  • Nine systems across three spheres, so no single model's opinion carries the reading
  • Every sweep recorded and retained, so a figure can be traced back
See the methodology
What this page does not claim

The honest limits, stated first.

  • This is perception, not performance. The figure describes how AI systems currently represent sportswear. It is not a measure of revenue, quality, or standing with customers, and should never be read as one.
  • The cohort is defined, not exhaustive. 10 brands are tracked in this sector. A brand's absence from the cohort is a scoping decision, not a judgement.
  • A week is not a direction. Model providers update continuously and answers move for reasons that have nothing to do with a brand. Read the series; treat any single week with suspicion.
  • Aggregates conceal. A category average can hold steady while individual brands move sharply in opposite directions. The sector figure is the beginning of the question, not the answer.

An instrument that admits what it cannot see is the only kind whose readings can be relied on where it can.

Instrument ARES-C 2.3 · Sportswear · Week 43 · 2026 · 10 brands
Sportswear

A sector reading tells you where the category stands. It does not tell you where you stand in it.

The Index ranks the category unprompted. To examine one brand by name, Pulse gives a quick health check the same business day; a Signal Audit takes it through the instrument at depth — every dimension, every model, with the evidence attached and the interpretation written by someone who has sat on your side of the table. Brand pages and full history for sportswear are on pitotindex.com.

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