Tyra Banks Comes Out of Retirement For Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Cover

Tyra Banks is back! The 45-year-old model turned television personality has come out of retirement to be featured on the 2019 edition of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit, the same magazine that gave her debut over twenty years ago.

In 1996, Banks made history as the first African-American woman to grace the cover of SI Swimsuit, when she appeared alongside Valeria Mazza. The shoot gave Banks her start, and she went on to be the sole model on the cover in 1997, a Victoria’s Secret angel from 1997 to 2005, and eventually one of the world’s top-earning models.

After retiring from modeling, Banks created America’s Next Top Model, which has been successfully running for 24 seasons. This SI shoot marks the first time Banks has returned to modeling herself in years.

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“This is for everybody that has been told they are not good enough because of their body, their age, their everything,” she wrote on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/tyrabanks/status/1126136231706939394

Banks’ cover is one of the three SI Swimsuit covers being released this year, alongside USA National Women’s soccer team player and Olympic gold medalist Alex Morgan and Camilla Kostek, winner of the 2018 SI Swimsuit model search. Inside, the edition includes shots of celebrities like Linsey Vonn, Olivia Culpo, Simone Biles and Winnie Harlow.

SI Swimsuit 2019 hits newsstands today.