rmariamp, I remember Julie Krone visiting the UK one time, many years ago, and if I am correct here, she rides at least one winner during this visit.
I am not aware that she wins your Triple Crown, as this is a tremendous achievment for any rider, male or female.
Over here, I do not think that women are discouraged from becoming either riders or trainers, but I feel there is maybe some prejudice against them as riders, and this is possibly a traditional prejudice rather than a practical one.
Certainly, there has never been a female jockey in the UK who has a reputation as high as Julie Krone.
In the activity of training, women have been around (officially) since the 1960’s, as before then the Jockey Club require a man to hold the licence. There are female trainers who win important races over here, for example Jenny Pitman wins two Grand Nationals and a two Cheltenham Gold Cups. These races are of course run over fences, and no other female trainer really equals these achievments on the flat, but I know of one or two who may do well given time and opportunity.
You know what, Nostradomus I’m very sorry because I got confused. Krone did not win the Triple Crown. She did win the Belmont Stakes and is the only women to ever win a Triple Crown Race (1993, Colonial Affair… who was by Pleasant Colony).
I guess I got a little overenthusiastic. :rolleyes:
I’d better watch out, though. Like you said: horse talk is contagious.
For whatever reason, women are NOT competitive in billiards/pool. Not even close. In straight pool, for example, the highest run ever by a woman was something like 89 balls in a row. Whereas on the men’s side, even college level players routinely run 100 balls, and the best players in the world have often run 150 balls to win the match without their opponent even stepping to the table.
In 9-ball, it’s not unusual at all to see a man run 3 or 4 racks in a row without missing, and several have won 9 in a row in competition. Earl Strickland won a million dollars a few years ago by breaking and running 11 racks without a miss.
On the women’s side it’s fairly rare to see them run even 2 racks, and the norm is for each player to get several opportunities at the table per game.
It’s actually understandable for women to be inferior to men in 9-ball, because the break is very important and it’s a ‘power’ break that requires strength. Straight pool, on the other hand, is a completely finesse game in which shots are almost never hit hard.
Snooker is the same, so women should be able to play at the same level. They don’t. I believe the top female snooker player in the world, Allison Fisher, tried to make in on the men’s circuit and never cracked the top 50.
Allison is now the top female 9-ball player, and the rest of the competition isn’t even close. There has been a lot of pressure on her to play against the men, but the only time she did so was to play a series of promotional matches against Grady Matthews, who is probably around 70 years old and no longer competitive on the men’s circuit. Grady eventually won 11 matches to 10.
Does anyone know what the putting percentage is for women vs men in golf? That’s something that should be completely equal. In fact, the men and women should play about as well in golf in the entire short game. Do they? If women could drive as far as men, could they compete?
Really? I’d heard it a lot and I also saw it on TV (so it has to be true!) when David Letterman was interviewing Geena Davis. They were talking about archery (because Davis had tried out for the Olympics) and Dave mentioned something about how the space in between the beats is different in women.
I’m not doubting you, I’m just telling you where I’d heard about it.
Well, winning the Belmont is no mean feat anyway, so do not worry.
And yes, horse talk is catching because as soon as I think of one thing it leads me to another, and it is possible to keep doing this for a very long time.
Still, I wait for over a month for these two threads to come up, and I now know two Dopers who are aficianados, so there it is.
From any given distance, one could reasonably suppose that men and women can putt equally well (then again, one could also suppose that women can play snooker as well as men).
Unfortunately, I don’t think statistics are available to test the proposition that women putt as well as men. I could not find a trace of putts per green in regulation for the women, which is the best test. Obviously, if you’re taking one more than regulation to reach a green, you should end up much closer to the pin, and therefore require fewer putts (I didn’t check GIR stats, because both the LPGA and PGA websites are very slow). I think it’s telling that they don’t show putts per GIR.
Total putts per round, however, shows this:
#1 on the LPGA is (stunningly, to me) Laura Davies, at 28.67 putts per round. Number 10 is Nancy Scranton at 29.32 putts per round. Number one on the men’s tour is Brad Faxon, with 27.89. Tied for 9th are Glen Day and Brian Gay at 28.20, still lower than the best woman.
I suspect that putts per GIR favor the men for two reasons–they are much more accurate with irons, and can put spin on the ball, which the women generally don’t (though a look at the GIR stats would prove this). More importantly, I would bet that the courses the men play (with the exception of Augusta) have greens from half to two-thirds the size of the courses the women play. Thus, even when women reach the green, they can be much further from the hole and, even all else equal, require more strokes to get down.
Asking if women could compete if they could drive as far as men isn’t really a fair question–it’s like asking if they could compete in tennis if they could serve over 130 mph. If they could drive as far as men, they’d have as much power in their swing, and be much more able to put bite on their irons. If they could drive as far as men but played the rest of the game, well, like women, I think they’d be several strokes behind.
[[I’ve heard that women are good at long distance events because their bodies handle pain better, but I can’t back that up.]]
I think it has more to do with how women store and metabolize fat.
Re. some of the other “sports” like billiards, the point should be made again that the number of men playing such games/sports recreationally - and so ending up competing at high levels - is much greater than that of women. With a larger pool to draw from, the naturals will emerge. Women are running the marathon now at a pace that would have broken world records for men a few decades ago. I’m not saying that men don’t have a natural advantage at certain sports, but it’s hard to compare when we are still raised so differently, too.
I’ve heard that women’s spatial perception is not as good as men’s. This was in the context of trying to explain why women are considered worse drivers, especially with parallel parking. Not sure of the validity of it (though from some of the women I know, it might well be true). This might explain why they don’t do as well at billiards.
I don’t have a cite since I heard it from a friend, but maybe somebody can prove or disprove this.
Hrm. I found several cites indicating that archery participants do indeed shoot between heartbeats, so as to remain as still as possible. I wonder, is there something about a woman’s heartbeat which would allow her to remain still better than a man? lower heartrate? less movement on each beat?
I don’t know if there is, but it doesn’t sound completely unreasonable.
I would suspect that women and men could be fairly equal in martial arts, since strength is not a factor so much as concentration, balance and agility.
Having made that assertion, I can’t believe my own cheek, since I don’t know dookie about martial arts or what factors are important for success.
Still, I’m entitled to an opinion, hare-brained as it may be.
How about chess? I understand this is under consideration as an Olympic sport. While I don’t consider chess to be a sport, the IOC in its less than infinite wisdom does, so I suppose it is one where men and women can compete on a level playing field. Just like in Monopoly, poker and Candyland.
It’s not mentioned in any cardiology text I own. And I’ve never seen differences in the over 1500 cardiac stress tests I’ve done on people. A quick google search (female heart difference:300,000 hits, female heart rhythm difference archery:2500 hits) elicited no relevant hits.
I think therefore, if you are going to assert that this myth is true, it is up to you to provide cites.
Women cannot compete with men in martial arts. Again, it’s not even close. Why do you think martial arts competitions are divided into weight classes? Even among men, a 20 lb difference in weight can be a big deal.
I saw a match once between a female martial artist and a male boxer. He wasn’t allowed to use his feet or anything else illegal to a boxer. When the match started she came out flying, and he just let her hit him. He just covered his face and stood there while she rained punches and kicks on him, then when she left an opening he hit her once and knocked her flat.
Thanks, PatrickM. You’ve just opened up a HUGE can o’ worms.
It used to be that the international chess governing body had separate classifications for men and women. It used to be that a Women’s Grandmaster (the highest rank a woman could achieve) was considered less of an achievement than simple “master” (a men’s ranking). Whether these distinctions remain today I don’t know; I haven’t followed organzied chess in years.
The rather yummy Judit Polgar is taking the chess world by storm, so watch out! Also, check out http://www.chessgoddesses.com for a more thorough treatment of women’s chess.
Bachee (Bochee???), lawn-darts, bowling, long-jump skiing, downhill skiing, snowboarding (half-pipe stuff), skateboarding, probably horse racing, auto racing, curling (Winter Olympic sport), rock climbing (yes it requires a lot of strength, but it is realitive to the climber), probably tons more, but that is all for now
Some of your suggestions have been disputed earlier in the thread, Evnglion. How about korfball though? It was specifically invented by a Dutch guy, Nico Broekhuysen, to allow men and women to compete together and requires mixed teams.
Again, I maintain that men outclass women re: downhill skiing. Mass increases velocity and sheer muscle provides for faster turns.
As for rock climbing, not likely. The world’s best in sport (competition) climbing are men. Radical rock climbing depends on many variables, not the least of which is almost superhuman arm, hand and finger strength–even if we take relative strength-to-weight ratios into account.
