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Sarah Hammod, Race to the Rock. Also Janie Hayes 3rd in TABR17
women tend to have greater endurance potential than men
Ultra races remove a bit of the 'normal racing' requirements to be super powerful or super light or aero or whatever. There's far more scope for stubbornness to triumph over watts/kg. Still, I've only seen a few wins by women, I'd hardly say they're better at ultra endurance than men if you look across all the races. But also there's less oppurtunity for women to get into the sport so perhaps we also aren't seeing the best performances yet across more events. It's still male dominated. We were talking about this the other day on twitter, at least the ultra aspect. https://www.dotwatcher.cc/results needs some statistical analysis from @wheels_of_fire something something n+1 something regression something fourier something pi something something a+b. I think he was speaking in tongues.
hippy-
Cheers. You've quoted me a little selectively here--to clarify: I have no idea if this theory that women might be better at (ultra-) endurance is true. I just find it an intriguing claim.
Ultra races remove a bit of the 'normal racing' requirements to be super powerful or super light or aero or whatever. There's far more scope for stubbornness to triumph over watts/kg. Still, I've only seen a few wins by women, I'd hardly say they're better at ultra endurance than men if you look across all the races. But also there's less oppurtunity for women to get into the sport so perhaps we also aren't seeing the best performances yet across more events. It's still male dominated.
Certainly, there isn't nearly enough evidence or data yet. It's harder to get, too, as ultra-endurance efforts take a lot longer than short bursts of strength. I think getting the potential talent pool among women activated could take generations. Hopefully it'll be quicker, but sex stereotyping is so pervasive and there are so many setbacks.
We were talking about this the other day on twitter, at least the ultra aspect. https://www.dotwatcher.cc/results needs some statistical analysis from @wheels_of_fire something something n+1 something regression something fourier something pi something something a+b. I think he was speaking in tongues.
In the meantime, I hope there'll be more and more long races in which there are proper duels between women and men. I'd find that extremely interesting to dotwatch.
Oliver Schick
Yes, Lael's ride is so far the only one that stands out. I'm still curious as to what will happen if more women take up endurance riding. So far, I think the pool of available talent is quite small.