And the Title of Fit Bottomed Girl of 2012 Goes to…

A true Fit Bottomed Girl, Mia Hamm!

This post is part of our FBG Birthday Week celebration! Check out all of the special four-year birthday posts and huge giveaways here!

When deciding on whom to name Fit Bottomed Girl of the Year for 2012, we knew it had to be someone who was strong, smart, focused, real and super-duper inspiring. Heck, she has to be able to hold her on in a room of Dara Torres, Ruby Gettinger and Stacy Lewis—which is no easy feat (those women rock!). While there were many candidates on our radar this year, only one stood out as someone we all truly wanted to be like: Mia Hamm.

Mia is widely recognized as the world’s best all-around women’s soccer player. In Atlanta at the 1996 Centennial Olympic Games, she lead her team to the gold medal, and in 1999 she helped the U.S. win the Women’s World Cup. In April of 1999, Nike named the largest building on its corporate campus after her. In addition to being super-awesome at soccer, she gives much of her free time to charitable causes and strives, in anything she does, to promote women’s athletics, the sport of soccer, and a feeling of confidence and sense of purpose in young people.

Um, yeah. A Fit Bottomed Girl through and through. We recently got to chat with Mia, as she’s been working with the Grain Foods Foundation, to virtually give her the FBG of the Year title and to find out more about what she’s up to these days, her workouts, her diet and her top tips. Although we gave her an honor, we were certainly honored to be in her presence…

Yeah, we totally geeked out that she accepted it. Now tell us, do you find Mia as inspiring as we do? Did she motivate you to play soccer or just become more of a bad-ass? What’s your favorite Mia moment? Do tell! —Jenn