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Sports Illustrated Offers Female Readers Beach Beauty Tips

Photo: Gustavo Caballero/Getty Images

Are you in need of some beachy beauty tricks on this blustery February morning? Hurry to your newsstand for the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue. This year’s edition offers a six-page style guide that is 100 percent guaranteed to make you look exactly like back-to-back cover model Kate Upton. (Happy Valentine’s Day, honey!) “It’s all things that every day beautiful women can do at home,” SI swimsuit editor M.J. Day told the New York Times. “Tousled beachy hair, very light makeup.”

So, why is Sports Illustrated trying to attract female readers right now? Trick question. It already has 18 million of them, according to in-house research. (Which … hands up, please?) Now the magazine is acknowledging female readers’ presence with the content they crave: a guide to narrowing the gap between themselves and the models in the magazine. As Slate’s Amanda Hess pointed out, “Calvin Klein model Matt Terry’s ass wearing nothing but a thin coat of liquid latex” would have been more equitable. Also, total coincidence, Target is a “marketing partner” for the issue and will be advertising six pages of women’s swimwear in the guide. Lend them your lady-eyeballs!

Sports Illustrated Offers Women Beauty Tips