Women in Sports

[RightWingNutJob]

The Longo thread got me thinking about this. What does Professional Cycling have to do to make the Girls more popular? In fact what does almost every major sport have to do. The only one that I can think of where the women rival the men in popularity is Tennis.
So what does Tennis do right?

 

[neil69cyclist]

The Longo thread got me thinking about this. What does Professional Cycling have to do to make the Girls more popular? In fact what does almost every major sport have to do. The only one that I can think of where the women rival the men in popularity is Tennis.
So what does Tennis do right?

Beach Volleyball uniform code, tennis dress code, sad but true, don't think this would make a big difference to cycling though.

What any womens branch of sport needs to do to is make it achievable or appealing to women as viewers or they have to make it appealing to men and for that to happen it has to be either of 2) things skillful on a par with the mens equivalent (and I think this is were tennis is fairly close) or have eye candy (again tennis does fall into this realm as does womens golf and obviously beach volleyball).

I did some work with a brand that was trying to capture womens market in sport and how to grow viewing figure across the board and unfortunately there is very little that can be done for the crossover.

 

[39*23t]

http://www.filmclips.be/images/Anna_Kournikova.jpg

well you did ask.
pity she didn't play volleyball

 

[neil69cyclist]

http://www.filmclips.be/images/Anna_Kournikova.jpg

well you did ask.
pity she didn't play volleyball

Maybe womens cycling could attract the men to watch !!!

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/138/345329059_947d3e8164.jpg?v=0

 

[anubisza]

pity she didn't play volleyball

She barely played tennis

 

[Pietro]

The Longo thread got me thinking about this. What does Professional Cycling have to do to make the Girls more popular? In fact what does almost every major sport have to do. The only one that I can think of where the women rival the men in popularity is Tennis.
So what does Tennis do right?

If you were asking about males in cycling would you have said, "...have to do to make the Boys more popular?"

Money, sponsors and the understandng that even if the playing field were level, women don't have the desire to compete on bicycles in the same numbers as men.

 

[eric_vv]

The answer is simple, people like to watch sport at the heighest level and for most sports that's men.

There are a number of sports were the difference in popularity is smaller than in cycling (Tennis, Athletics, Swimming, etc), but that's usually down to both competing at the same tournaments.Tennis being a prime example with both in action at the same major tournaments. I doubt if woman's tennis would be as popular if they would have had seperate tournaments (from the start, they would probably survive a split now). The difference in popularity within track cycling is much less in track cycling than it is on the road which is also a good indication. The men's event remain the main event in most peoples eyes though.

There are other reasons off course, with ofton more depth in men's sport,most sports started out as men only so have more tradition.

Now there probably are sports where the woman are more popular than the man in seperate events but I can't think of any. (waiting for some obvious examples I missed).

So what does cycling have to do? Combine events? A woman's race running at the same time and for as long (over the same final) as the men's Tour and other big races (finishing about 2-3 hours before the men) would help woman's cycling gain popularity. The TV stations, the facilities and the fans would already be there and the press would probably cover the woman's race (just a short summary at first by a couple of stations, but maybe live coverage in a few years from an increasing number of nations) and woman's cycling would get more exposure. From then on it's up to them to improve (especially in depth) and show a good race.

 

[39*23t]

She barely played tennis

and yet you still watched

 

[workingclasshero]

She barely played tennis

bit unfair on me anna that

she was ranked as number 8 in the world in singles. that's about where i reckon we'll find lance armstrong in the tour

and me anna was numbero uno in doubles, she even won two grand slams

still love her

ps. some amazing photos of her out there

http://www.hollywood-celebrity-pictures.com/Celebrities/Anna-Kournikova/Anna-Kournikova-26.JPG

http://images.newcelebritypics.com/...nna_kournikova_in_sprots_illustrated-3442.jpg

http://top-people.starmedia.com/tmp...HUGVVCGXLLVBLB3BSZQ==/imgAnna Kournikova1.jpg