and left London with two gold medals. Opposition to Rule 40 Throughout the Olympic season, Richards-Ross had appeared at the forefront of an athlete-driven #WeDemandChange movement advocating against the International Olympic Committee's (IOC) controversial Rule 40, a regulation that forbids Olympic athletes and coaches from acknowledging personal, non-Olympic sponsors by name, wearing additional logos on apparel, or promoting them on social media two weeks before or during the Olympic Games. The rule strived to prevent ambush marketing and concentrate viewer attention on messages from official Olympic sponsors, such as Coca-Cola and Visa, which had paid a hefty amount for exclusive partnerships with the Games, although none of the multi-billion dollar revenue trickled into athletes' pockets. Prior to the London Olympics, she sparked a discussion on the topic, tweeting, "With $6 billion exchanging hands during the Olympics why do the athletes compete for free?!? #QuestionsThatNeedAnswers #WeDemandChange." Since track and field professionals earn the vast majority of their income through sponsorship deals, Rule 40 prevents them from thanking personal sponsors for their endorsement and also dissuades potential non-Olympic sponsors from investing in these athletes when the sport is receiving the most attention. Starting on July 29, 2012, a group of U.S. track and field athletes, including Trey Hardee, Bernard Lagat, Nick Symmonds, and Dawn Harper-Nelson, coordinated a Twitter campaign to criticize the restriction on athletes' rights, posting messages with hashtags #WeDemandChange, #Rule40, and #WeDemandChange2012. Richards-Ross spoke at a news conference regarding the #WeDemandChange campaign on the following day and explained that although she was fortunate to have secured major sponsorships to continue her training and treatment, many athletes have to work two or three jobs to be able to afford to stay in the sport. Answering conference reporters, she said, “I’ve been very fortunate to do very well around the Olympics, but so many of my peers struggle in the sport, and I think it's unjust that they're not being considered, that athletes are not part of the conversation.” At the Olympic Village in London, Richards-Ross helped organize a group of track and field athletes to share their concerns, further their message to the IOC, and discuss potential regulation amendments to accommodate the athletes, with several options including permission to post sponsors on social media, clearance to wear non-Olympic sponsor logos, and IOC-funded prize money. Efforts by these track and field athletes, along with later campaigns voicing Olympic athletes' discontent, finally pushed