Women's Racing - do you why? why not?

Eden

Hi
The women's part of the forum hasn't been getting much traffic recently so I thought I'd try to jump start things a bit.

I'm interested in knowing how many of you out there are thinking about getting into racing. If so why have you or why haven't you started yet?

If you race now tell me about it and how it was to get started.

Thanks!
Eden

Ullefan

I race road, mostly TT, about once every 2 weeks in summer. I'm into cyclo-cross in winter. What? Can't a girl get dirty once in a while?
I used to mountain bike, this was mostly before I started road racing, but not anymore! I was embarassingly thrown out of my team and my licence confiscated when a friend divulged that I was originally a man when we were
peeing. But i'm a woman now! So unfair!

Eden

Hmmm a little off of the topic I was hoping to start, but certainly raises all sorts of issues that would be interesting in its own thread. (yes I think that the women's forum would be an appropriate place to discuss this)

Personally I have pretty liberal social views, what you do with your life and body is your business and no one elses as far as I'm concerned. That said whether or not I would want to compete against you I can't really say. I can't speak for all women and there are very strong women out there, but I know that I could not be competetive with most men and what happens to the physiology of a transgendered person raises all sorts of questions that I am not qualified to answer. In any case I encourage you to start a thread to discuss it.

Mellic

Sorry to go off the topic a bit, but I'm not suprised you got thrown out of your team. I don't think it is fair that you should be competing in a women's category even if you have had a sex change and are taking female hormones! You are always going to have a physiological advantage no matter what you do to yourself.

For example you cannot alter your lung capacity by taking female hormones. The average man has a lung capacity of 6 litres and the average woman 4 litres, therefore, men are able to transfer more oxygen to their muscles allowing them to ride a lot faster.

Anyway I'm not trying to be mean to you and I'm not trying to say that having a sex change is bad, but I just think that it is not right for someone like yourself to be out there making "female competitive sports" any harder than they should be.

If we start accepting people who have had sex changes at a state, national, or international level then I'm sure plenty of blokes will be lining up to have the chop.

Ullefan

Where have you read that? It may be true that man have a greater lung capacity than women, but that is only because men are as a rule larger than women. Their oxygen requirements are greater, because of their larger bodies, which means larger organs such as the brain to require more oxygen. What matters your oxygen to mass ratio. So theoretically, all other things being equal, it is possible that a woman could beat a man in race if her oxygen gain is greater for each kilogram of her body mass than the man's. I say only in a bicycle race because in running for example, stride length is also important.

Mellic

Yes you are correct to some extent that men do have a greater oxygen uptake to women, but reasearch has shown that larger cyclists (males) have a lower oxygen requirement relative to body weight in comparison to smaller cyclists (women) at a given speed (Swain et al., 1998).

In addition to this women also carry a higher percentage of body fat which influences absolute body weight, making it more difficult for elite women to reach the speeds of elite men, particularly when climbing. The hormones they give transexuals does help to increase body fat percentage but not to the same extent.

Men generally have a larger foot increasing their functional lever system on the bicycle.

Women have wider hips which changes the orientation of the hip muslces which also reduces performance.

This was a hotly debated topic last year by the IOC and it was clearly shown that a transexual could never rule out all of the physiological and morphological advantages when changing from male to female.

Zub_Zub

I race for my school team(im only 16). We have about seven girls who race.. but one crashed a week or two ago and now has a broken collar bone. In auckland there is about 30 female school teams who race. The ages range from about 12 to 18. Ive been racing since i started cycling about 4 years ago.
We do a team time trail along a flat 16km bit of road. We also have two races at a different places where the road is not as flat.
We also do races by our selves. We hvae a four km timetrail, and a hile climb. Both are very fun races.

Marie

Ullefan

True, but I did say ''all other things being equal.'' And no, i'm not a transexual.

Eden

When I saw your first post I thought you just might be a troll , but I felt the best way to deal with you was to take it seriously and be polite, you could have valid concerns. Now I am just ticked that you hijacked what was meant to be a serious thread for women to discuss how they got into racing or why they have been considering it but haven't taken the plunge. (thank you for your post Zub Zub)

Mellic

I really cannot tolerate guys like you. You think it's funny to come on here and be a prick? And then you turn around and say that you cannot take women cycling seriously. Maybe that is the real reason why not many women cycle in the first place, because arrogant pigs like you think that cycling (and most other sports) is not the place for women.

Well I hate to tell you, we don't live in the 1950's anymore! I feel sorry for any lady that might enter your life. I can see her right now wiping your arse for a living.

Hmmmmm.....when faced with the choice of wiping someones arse or cycling I know what I would choose.

Just a suggestion, if you cannot take women cycling seriously then perhaps you should not bother visiting the women's section of this forum.

Ullefan

Can you honestly take women cycling seriously? If you do, you need help I think. The only part I take 'serious' if any is making sure I get behind babes.

nanook08

you are such a pig. I know a few chicks who could kick you ass, on or off the bike. Why do you even bother coming around this forum?

Ullefan

Whenever i'm with a woman, I always make sure I ride behind.

nanook08

Of course you are riding behind women; you say that as if you think you are doing it by choice and not because you suck.