28th in a professional race for women? Quite an accomplishment? While being able to take any of the race courses would be a good thing for most of us, to call a "professional cyclist"'s performance in a race where 27 other women finished ahead of her "quite an accomplishment" is a joke. Especially considering that most would take a similar statement when it comes to the men's races and dismiss or laugh it off.

Has Liz Hatch ever done anything noteworthy as a "professional cyclist"? Won or placed (that means got to get up on a podium) in races?

What still sticks with me about Danica Patrick is the comment she made in an interview about feeling good because Bar Refaeli thought she was just another one of the models. Tells you where Danica's heart is.

Remarkably, women's tennis is a similar thing to IRL and Danica Patrick when it comes to marketing and publicity. Anna Kournikova is much a similar case to Danica. Played just well enough to get noticed, and then off to the modeling career. The same story: Model first, tennis player second. Thankfully for the credibility of tennis, she did wash out eventually from that. But still rather known. Not for tennis, but for modeling herself.

I'm sure, though, that the powers-that-be in tennis weren't blind to what happened with Ms. Kournikova, and made changes accordingly (looks and sex appeal get their matches shown, not necessarily the best players or most competitive matches; I'm sure along with bringing in those east-european supermodels).

1) You're pointing out the exact problem with the sport this thread was meant to discuss. Female athletes who don't look like models are less prevalent in mass-media broadcasting... THAT'S WRONG. This is barbaric nonsense that most of the civilized world is ready to overcome, and you who don't comply WILL be left ridiculed and alienated for in the next ten years (i.e. MY DECADE, get used to it)
2) As far as the vain nature of sport celebrities, this works both ways...
Micheal Phelps: More attractive than I am
Kobe Bryant: More attractive than I am
Lance Armstrong: More attractive than I am
Peyton Manning: More attractive than I am
BarracksSi: Isn't, see...




ALL PEOPLES social success is somewhat dependent on their physical appearance, regardless of male or female.

Progress would be defined by the number of OTHER characteristics that make a person great.

I'm active in these forums because I'm active in all sorts of types of road cycling. I've been riding regularly since I was a kid, I've commuted to and from work by bicycle, I've spent several years racing, I've gotten into the Long Distance side of things, and I've toured in various parts of the world.

For me, cycling is about as natural as walking.

But it isn't that way for most women ... see my post #337 here:

https://www.bikeforums.net/showpost.p...&postcount=337


And, as you will see when you read that post, even though I've got heaps of experience riding on the road, when I took a peak into the Mountain Bike forum I left without posting my question because I was immediately intimidated. I suspect that's how a lot of women feel when they take a peak in here.

Hey machka, I don't know anything about the mtb forum, but you can't let a few idiots get you down. It's like the roads. Rednecks and asshоles want to take us down a peg, but don't give them the satisfaction.

You know that the way demographics work -- we will always have a certain percentage (meaning high) of chowderheads. We have our two wheeled equivalent of the morons who need big jacked up trucks to feel tough. But there are also plenty of guys at every level in the sport that can really be a class act.

Cycling is still too hostile to females. That's bad and it needs to change. By not kowtowing to the idoicy, you help make it better. Hang in there. We all appreciate it.

Now that is a sport worth watching.

Personally I think anyone who works their way up to pack fodder in the pro peloton, man or woman, has managed "quite an accomplishment."

The one thing that hasn't been mentioned is that overwhelmingly professional sports and mass media outlets (TV, radio, magazines etc) are owned by Men. Given the prevalent attitudes in this thread, is it any wonder that calender shoots, sexy posters and skimpier clothing than their male counterparts is part of the marketing package for women's sports? They are trying to market female athletes to a market comprised of Men ... those posters and outfits aren't for the ladies, guys.

The decision to participate is not simply one of choice either. You participate in the sexually based marketing or, in many cases, you don't participate in the sport. Or at least you participate with much less support, funding etc.

Beach volleyball is a great example. What athlete in their right mind would voluntarily choose to wear a tiny bikini while participating in a sand sport instead of compression shorts etc? If you don't want to wear the teeny-tiny bikini in order to satisfy the male viewership, you don't play beach volleyball at a high level. Many of the men, on the other hand, even wear tank tops with their beach shorts.

Perhaps one of the reasons that the WNBA is not so popular is that, unless I've missed it, they have eschewed this sort of sexual based marketing to focus on the sport instead. TV viewership suffers, but if the NY Liberty game I attended in NYC is anything to go on, live attendance is just fine. And the throngs of young girls getting autographs after the game was a great thing to see.

Women's tennis, while it benefits from the (archaic tradition) of short tennis skirts is actually a more tactical game than Mens ... a lot of my male friends are rather rabid tennis fans, and many prefer the wome's game over the men's as the lack of raw power actually makes for more interesting and prolonged exchanges.

In my country, the bars are just as packed for the ladies international hockey games as they are for the mens, and every little girl can decide to play hockey (not ringette!) if she wishes, and easily find supportive teams and programs. Though it's kind of different perhaps, there isn't the sort of parity with amateur football in the US, is there?

Perhaps what we are looking at here is simply another example of American cultural politics lagging behind much of the rest of the world (Canada, Western Europe).

I know this is going to be taken the wrong way, but I've been thinking about it off and on all night. It's sad to think that some of the attitudes in this thread can persist in a nation (s) that are currently embroiled in wars in two countries in which our brave troops are dying in an effort that is at least partially directed at providing measures of freedom and equality to women. Women who in turn are being assassinated at an alarming rate whenever and wherever they try to take up the mantle of political and cultural inclusion in Afghanistan (for example). In Canada at least, our involvement in Afghanistan (two more dead soldiers this week) is presented as an effort toward extending security and human rights. Let's try that at home too, hmmm?

I suspect you were just overwhelmed by the pot fumes.

Not even close to true. There are lots of us here, even a few of us in RC. Some even have usernames that you can't tell they are women.

Let's market sports toward women and see how that goes.

Right, because it was America that put Gymnasts in those tight leos, and iceskaters in those skimpy outfits.

See my discussion of the WNBA. It doesn't meet the criteria for over the top mass appeal sporting success like the NBA, but it seems to be a) marketed at women and b) doing OK, at least in terms of live attendance (admittedly, this is based on one game that I went to).

And yeah, maybe, just maybe, we should see how that goes.

Here's an example of how the tone of this forum affects me, personally. I have some pretty cool pictures from my bike rides, and some of them are of me and my friends.

If I was a guy, I would post them in various threads, we all like to do the "look at me and my bike on top of this awesome mountain pass, I want to share my accomplishment!!!"

But I never do that in Road, because of the catcalls and/or insults about how I/we look that I think I would end up with.

In both of these sports, men wear comparable tight, form fitting leotard or body suits. In both sports, wearing these outfits is actually somewhat appropriate to performance of the sport, which is probably why both genders wear them.

Sports that are more widely marketed - unlike gymnastics and ice skating which are basically Olympic only TV events - are much more likely to involve skimpy or different clothing for women. Beach volleyball (which weirdly, is not just an Olympic only TV event), tennis etc. And the marketing which surrounds female athletes in other sports ... car racing, cycling have been used as examples thus far.

Exactly. How few pics of female cyclists do we see in ride report threads vs pics of guys. Wonder why?

tell the idiots to f off. would that be a hostile reaction? do it anyway.

Beaches are funny that way...

it's not just road.

a few months ago, someone posted pics from a ride. in the one of the pics there was a woman.

while that pic resulted in an insipid post by a RC poster, things got weird when one of the Foo Flakes chimed in, then went on to create a thread about her.

The reason that it won't work is that in most sports, women can't compete with men. So even if you are watching a woman be the best of the best in women, you are not watching the best of all people.

Take baseball for example. Baseball's popularity sored during the home run era. Same people, just doing it better. Kind of supports the idea that people go to watch the long ball. Now put on a womans game. There is no long ball. Wait, let's move the fence in... NOW, if women could hit more homeruns in the same park than men, you have a different story. Maybe.

And, even if you put the women in bikinis, the men wouldn't watch it for more than a season. Guys may like to see a half naked woman, but they also take their sports seriously.

Reading this thread is like watching the last three episodes of the Batchelor: the outcome makes little difference but you get emotionally invested enough to want to see how it turns out anyway.

But let's face it, with the exception of me (who learned just a tremendous amount from Dr Pete and trigger, things that had been up to this point beyond my cognition), the strong sensitive men who are nearly perfect in every way will stay that way, the pigs will wallow in their own poop, the the ones who go through live thinking things aren't fair because they are women; gay; black; Republican; Christian; Martian will remain aggrieved forever and probably wouldn't have it any other way.

Did Brandy Chastain cheapen the sport or flaunt her sexuality when she ripped off her jersey and ran around in her sports bra? I'm not aware of any man having forced her to do that.

This just bugs the hell out of me. It ignores the fact that SOME women take advantage of attention in other situations.

It also comes across as if guys don't get crap on here too. I have seen way more guys get flamed for some part of their body or looks or you name it than I have seen woman get harassed.

It also comes across as if the percentage of guys that are aholes is larger than the percentage of women that like the attention.

How is a woman getting a catcall any more hurtfull that a guy getting crap for having small legs. (not me, I've never posted a picture, I couldn't stand the rejection)

Seriously??

Seriously.