The Germans are sports stars. They’re the reigning World Cup champions in soccer, they dominated the 2016 Rio Olympics and, recently, they have been outperforming the competition in the sportswear industry as well.

Adidas, headquartered in Germany, may have fallen behind Nike throughout most of the past decade, but Adidas has experienced a powerful resurgence in the past couple of years due to releases of timeless classics, collaborations with designers and impressive new technologies implemented on their clothing and shoes.

The top-selling shoe on the market in 2016, according to SneakerNews.com, doesn’t have revolutionary technology. It doesn’t have collaborations with Lebron James, Drake or Cristiano Ronaldo.

But what keeps the brand relevant is the Adidas Superstar. Retailing at $80, the shoe sells for a reasonable price tag, which is one of the factors that propelled the Superstar past Nike’s most popular but expensive sneakers, such as the “VaporMax,” which retails for roughly $190 at most outlets. Adidas’s iconic shell toe is an essential part of streetwear that first released in 1969, emphasizing the longevity of the brand’s design compared to Nike.

Regarding the U.S. athletic footwear market this summer, Adidas’s sneaker sales rose 74 percent while Nike dipped a couple of percentage points. Although Nike is still the wealthier compan, Adidas’s market share hit a record-high 13 percent earlier this year, surpassing Jordan Brand for the first time in years.

Decades before Nike rolled out its first sneakers, Adidas was already writing sports history. The German brand of the Dassler brothers dates back to 1949, 15 years before Nike was founded. It’s not the oldest sports brand out there, but no other sports apparel brand has been producing quality sportswear for athletes for so time. There is no doubt that the memorabilia from this brand’s history could fill an entire museum.

In recent years, “Boost,” a cushioning system that was meant to aid high-performance runners, has come to define an era of Adidas shoes. Given that “Boost” is part of almost every one of Adidas’s most popular shoes, it is clear that it has become what many athletes consider to be the most comfortable cushioning system on the market.

A couple of years ago, I purchased Derrick Rose’s sixth signature shoe, a mostly gray model with a synthetic leather upper and full-length “Boost” on the bottom. I was skeptical about the seemingly exaggerated effects of “Boost.” However, after playing basketball in the shoes a couple of times, the difference in terms of support and stability was apparent.

I found the $150 shoe from Adidas much more comfortable than the previous Nike basketball shoes that I had worn. As a result of the “Boost,” I did not feel any pain in my joints after long periods of play. The shoe was also much more durable than my old Nikes — lasting a whole year without any noticeable issues, whereas my previous Nikes all experienced significant wear-and-tear in months.

Pleased with the purchase, I invested in a pair of “Crazy Explosive” basketball shoes, “Ultra Boost” running shoes and a number of the Adidas’s shirts and pants the following year. Again, I was delighted with the quality. Based on these experiences, I am now a believer in Adidas.

Adidas’s sneaker business isn’t the only area of the company on the rise. It has also been dominating in terms of clothing — many students on campus own Adidas’s signature black track pants with three stripes along the side.

The classic performance pants, which were first introduced in the ‘60s, has ridden the athletic leisure wave perfectly. On menswear runways all over the world today are styles inspired by these pants, like Kanye’s “Calabasas” version, which is essentially a higher quality version of the same track pants.

Furthermore, Adidas is garnering a lot of attention from the hip-hop crowd by working with Kanye West, Pharrell Williams, Pusha T and others. Kanye’s patented “Yeezy Boost,” are easily the hottest commodities on the sneakers market. Even with the expensive price tag of $220, they sell out within minutes anytime a new colorway drops and then resell for up to 10 times the original price.

Not only is Adidas a formidable presence in the hip-hop sphere, but its reach in high fashion is being amplified with the help of designers Raf Simons, Rick Owens and Alexander Wang, in sharp contrast to Nike’s less successful efforts with Kim Jones and Olivier Rousteing.

Without a doubt, both Adidas and Nike are popular, but by sticking to its athletic roots, engaging with today’s society and culture and combining performance with style, Adidas now reigns supreme.