The Air Jordan XVIII was released in 2003. Tate Kuerbis was head designer of the Air Jordans 18. Tate Kuebis is a person that had been part of the jordan footwear design team since 1999 and with Nike since 1995. So designing shoes was nothing new to Tate. The inspiration of the design is a combination of a number of things; Sleek racing lines of the auto world, Carbon fiber-based monocoque of F1 race cars, Race car driving shoes (rubber heel wrap) and Fine Italian dress shoes (bold stitching on the soles).