International Women’s Day: Bang Your Head Against A Wall

I know what you mean Hannah. I still feel Pinkbike handled today with more class though.
Linking to some of their coverage of women riding. Maybe you could have done some of that to show how Singletrack is promoting women rather than moaning at the rest of society.
Lead by example perhaps?

Incredibly well-put Hannah, and I think you’re Bob-on.

The fact that women’s racing still appears to be an after-thought in 2017 is not good enough.

And I have to disagree @eddiebaby – today is the perfect day to call out inequality and to draw people’s attention to it. Otherwise indifference only supports the status quo and the inequality it sustains.

Though I will leave my personal opinion out about Pinkbike and gender equality 🙂

Oh, and maybe start with the ratio of men to women on the cover pics.
The gallery of past covers isn’t exactly 50/50.
And yes, as I said in my previous post I’ve been there with the problem of equality in print in a male dominated sport and understand the problems of using stunning images supplied by company paid photographers. Time to put the pressure on them and stand by your principles.

I just read this and I think it highlights some of the issues within cycling more generally around equality (not just female participation).

I tend to view cycling in general as quite an open, inclusive activity, I think the problems often come when “regulated/governed competitive cycling” rears it’s head.
Yes there’s certainly greater male participation in cycling (as with almost any sport) but you’d probably find there’s also a few other demographic bias’ involved in cycling participation, not only are men more likely to sling a leg over a bike and race, but those men will probably be disproportionately White and Middleclass… Of course the UCI would be (rightly) lambasted if they actively sought to exclude non-whites or those from poorer backgrounds from any tier of competition, why is it acceptable to exclude women from UCI sanctioned competition then?

What they’ve done in effect here though is state they’ll test the water on a new format with the “Prime Demographic” and if it sticks we might allow everyone else to have a pop…

I have to agree with oceandweller, “Short Course XC” sounds like the perfect introduction/gateway format, so why limit it to elite males? it should be targeted squarely at youths and Juniors and certainly include female participants otherwise it has the opposite effect and only serves to deter people from getting into racing in the first place…

I’m not sure I follow your points eddiebaby are you saying STW needs more “Women specific Content” or that it’s not worth catering for/including women in your audience because there’s not as many taking part?

Just want to defend Singletrack at @eddiebaby’s comments on equal participation/coverage.

Singletrack somewhat recently had an all-female design team, (Jorji and myself) and a three-quarters female editorial team (Chipps, Jenn, Jorji and myself). You’d be hard-pressed to find that in any sports publication anywhere. Mag content might not have directly reflected those ratios… but three positions filled by females in a very small, male-dominated industry is something to be proud of.

*** Despite the screen name, I’m no longer am employed by ST. Opinions my own, not Singletrack’s. ***

Ps just wanted to add, I don’t think I agree with Eddiebabys outlook though, I believe we are just starting to see the beginning of more women participating in the sport, you see way more on the trails than you used too. Only when it’s a truly equal sport will it really start to flourish.