# Men competing against women in the olympics **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Tags:** olympic-sports-track\ **Created:** [August 2, 2021, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899 "2021-08-02T21:45:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![TheGunIsMightierThanThePen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thegunismightierthanthepen/32/2981_2.png) [@TheGunIsMightierThanThePen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheGunIsMightierThanThePen)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2021, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/41 "2021-08-03T19:46:55Z")
Well, I meant “not trained” more in the sense that they have no experience with it whatsoever, rather than occasionally using another sport or technique as cross-training for their primary sport. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2021, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/42 "2021-08-03T19:54:01Z")
> [@TheGunIsMightierThanThePen](#): > > Men trained in a particular sport vs. women trained in that same sport = men wins > > Men not trained in a particular sport vs. women trained in that same sport = women wins > > I may be dense, but IMO it doesn’t get much deeper than that. I think that’s true for the vast majority of sports/events. The question is whether there are any sports events in which some combination of (a) raw physical strength/size/speed give a massive advantage (b) the skill being tested is very similar to, or even a part of, skills employed in other events or (c) other olympic athletes just happen to play/compete in this sport/event at a reasonably high level; to allow the not-specifically-trained men to compete with the trained women. As I said, I think the best bet might be middle distance running. There are plenty of athletes who run as either part of the sport or part of the training for their sport. For a team sport, soccer is probably most likely. Lots and lots of people from around the world play soccer moderately seriously. How good are the 11 best male soccer players from among non-soccer male olympians, and would their huge edge in size, strength and speed allow them to compete with more-skilled women who have trained together as a team? And are we talking “a month of training together” or “put together a pickup team and play tomorrow”? Honestly, I’m not sure which way I think it would go. ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2021, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/43 "2021-08-03T19:59:22Z")
I have a high school buddy who ran a 10.7 hundred metre to win the provincial championship when fifteen. He never got better and did not get highest level coaching. But he was a prodigy who trained for years and attended Olympia sports camp many times. To think most people could do that is straight up wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2021, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/44 "2021-08-03T23:50:53Z")
I can’t think of any sport that does not have a very significant technical component. The easiest ones might be the luge and bobsled although one suspects there is more to it than one thinks. Go Jamaica! ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/45 "2021-08-04T00:22:13Z")
Yeah, if we are putting an untrained man up against Olympic women, the man’s going to lose just about everything. Even sports like weightlifting that look like pure strength contests have a serious amount of skill involved. I originally thought that the question would be more like, “If men and women all competed together in open events, how many golds could the women win?” ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/46 "2021-08-04T00:50:03Z")
> [@Dr\_Paprika](#): > > The easiest ones might be the luge and bobsled although one suspects there is more to it than one thinks. Are you kidding? You basically steer with subtle movements of your butt, feet and whole body while speeding down a a maze of curves at a speed of 140 km/h on an ice canal, while barely being able to see ahead because you have to hold your head level to avoid air resistance (luge). That takes skills that nobody has who hasn’t learned that craft from the cradle. ---
**Author:** ![penultima\_thule](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penultima_thule/32/3833_2.png) [@penultima\_thule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/penultima_thule)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/47 "2021-08-04T01:48:59Z")
… and yet the fanciful but graphic image of Usain Bolt doing a luge or skeleton run with those gangly arms & legs of a 1.95m (6’5") guy flailing about and looking as white as a ghost at the end will keep me smiling most of the day. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/48 "2021-08-04T02:04:33Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > Are you kidding? That’s the driver. The pushers job is mostly done when they get into the bobsled. After that they are ballast with a pulse. Track stars are often recruited into bobsled because it doesn’t need much skill; see Lolo Jones and Herschel Walker. Luge and skeleton are another story. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/49 "2021-08-04T02:08:30Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > Luge and skeleton are another story. I was referring to the luge. Though what I wrote also applies to the driver of the bobsled. The rest of the crew have to be good sprinters and provide some weight in the first place, that’s true, but at least they must know how to balance their weight according to the curves. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/50 "2021-08-04T04:14:18Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Yeah, if we are putting an untrained man up against Olympic women, the man’s going to lose just about everything. Even sports like weightlifting that look like pure strength contests have a serious amount of skill involved. I mean, it obviously varies _some_ sport to sport. Some running race is a lot more plausible than gymnastics or bouldering or synchronized swimming. And also, we’re not talking about random joe schlub couch potato, or even random-pretty-fit-gym-guy. We’re talking about an olympic champion, a man who is at the absolute peak of human athletic potential, and we’re picking one from a wide variety of skill sets to match the target skill set as closely as possible. I mean, I’m certainly not guaranteeing anything, but I don’t think this hypothetical set of competitions would be a clean sweep for the women. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/51 "2021-08-04T05:44:48Z")
It kinda depends on what everyone means by “not trained in that sport”. Could you take a male water polo player and put him up against a woman in a swimming race, and in what strokes? I hear the butterfly is hard to master, but would he have a chance in freestyle? How 'bout the other way around; would a team of male swimmers have a chance against women in water polo? ---
**Author:** ![Oredigger77](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oredigger77/32/3181_2.png) [@Oredigger77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oredigger77)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/52 "2021-08-04T13:29:28Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > It kinda depends on what everyone means by “not trained in that sport”. Another take would be a lot of Olympians played other sports in high school or in college at what point does that count as training? When I played rugby after college we had a lot of ex football guys come out and while it took them a bit to get the hang of the rules most of them got the idea of tackling and running with the ball quickly. There was a human interest bit on the coverage last night about one of the Olympians who had to choose between the NFL and the Olympics. I bet you could put together a brutal rugby team between ex soccer and football players who went on to be Olympians in other sports. ---
**Author:** ![Danger\_Man](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6de8d8/32.png) [@Danger\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Danger_Man)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/53 "2021-08-04T13:31:39Z")
I think we can define not-trained as whatever training you can get away with while still keeping the gold medal in your original sport. And if you wanted to compete against women in several events, you would need to divide your training between them. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/54 "2021-08-04T17:33:07Z")
How are we treating team events, here? Take softball, for instance: Is our one single male athlete the pitcher on an otherwise all-women team, or does he get to bring in a bunch of male teammates? ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/55 "2021-08-04T19:22:38Z")
Maybe the luge was a bad example. I did not mean that there is no technical skill to the luge or bobsled - there are consistent winners. Both are fast and probably scary. With a bobsled, being unproficient will slow you down but if you make it to the bottom in one piece, though slower than an expert, the gravity has a bigger effect on relative time than the technical skill. For the luge, sure you can wipe out. But I do not know if you would make it to the bottom to the gravity just by reacting the way one might to scary upcoming turns and trying to keep balanced. If you can make it to the bottom in the absence of specific training than my point is still valid. It probably is not. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/56 "2021-08-04T19:33:03Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > I mean, it obviously varies _some_ sport to sport. Some running race is a lot more plausible than gymnastics or bouldering or synchronized swimming. And also, we’re not talking about random joe schlub couch potato, or even random-pretty-fit-gym-guy. We’re talking about an olympic champion, a man who is at the absolute peak of human athletic potential, and we’re picking one from a wide variety of skill sets to match the target skill set as closely as possible. I mean, I’m certainly not guaranteeing anything, but I don’t think this hypothetical set of competitions would be a clean sweep for the women. Yeah, it mostly boils down to whether it’s a strength sport or a skill sport. With sports where a man can out-physical a woman with sheer physical advantage, he _might_ beat a trained female boxer or wrestler, if he’s a big stout guy. But for a finesse sport like table tennis, badminton or archery, the untrained male Olympian is absolutely toast. A guy like Michael Phelps or Usain Bolt would be lucky to even score a single point in table tennis against a woman like Sofia Polcanova or Kasumi Ishikawa. ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Sensitive](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/58956e/32.png) [@Darth\_Sensitive](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Sensitive)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/57 "2021-08-04T19:46:16Z")
I think the sheer physical advantage stuff may go away as you get into weight classes too. Sure, your multi-millionaire basketball players may have the physicality to beat the someone in boxing and wrestling, but once you match them up against someone approximately their own size, that probably is strongly reduced. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2021, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/58 "2021-08-04T22:17:48Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > How are we treating team events, here? Take softball, for instance: Is our one single male athlete the pitcher on an otherwise all-women team, or does he get to bring in a bunch of male teammates? I was envisioning an entire team of men, but… whatever. That’s why I think soccer is a case where a team of men might win. Enough men from around the world play fairly serious recreational soccer, that there are probably 11 men at the olympics right now who are not there for soccer, but play a lot of soccer and are in absolutely peak physical/athletic condition. They would be bigger, stronger and faster than the gold-medal winning women’s olympic team (Canda or Sweden), but less skilled and much less organized. I’m honestly not sure which way it would go. Softball (or something like water polo) would be MUCH harder for men to win, because so few men are likely to have a pretty good starting familiarity with it. ---
**Author:** ![filmore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7993a0/32.png) [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2021, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/59 "2021-08-05T16:51:11Z")
The male triathletes may be good candidates since they train in swimming, biking, and running. They would probably medal in the 1500m swim, but I’m not sure about the 800m. They would probably medal in the 22k and 137k road bike events. They would likely medal in the 1500m and 10k runs. The marathon is a bit of a question mark since it’s a lot longer than their normal distance of 10k. They may do well in the cycling track events since they have biking experience. I would think that their general fitness would mean they would do well in team sports like soccer, field hockey, and water polo where they could tire out their opponents. But these team sports would be really interesting to see how they played out. If the women tried to compete against the men on strength and speed, the women would probably lose. But if instead the women played a more precise game that is based on skill and control, they could do well. Like if the women played more keep away with precise passes that get them close to the goal, they could win over the men who would be playing faster and stronger, but more sloppily. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2021, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899/60 "2021-08-08T12:35:04Z")
> [@Oredigger77](#): > > I’d probably pick the US men’s decathlon champ or a swimmer to get the most medals. Garrett Scantling won the decathlon at the US trials so I’ll use his times from there. Just to follow up on that, consider Kevin Mayer: this past week, he didn’t finish first in the Decathlon, and he didn’t even finish first in any of the events, but his javelin throw would’ve earned a woman a gold medal while setting a new Olympic record — and his pole vault would’ve earned a woman a gold medal while setting a new Olympic record — and his high jump, like his long jump, would’ve earned a woman a gold medal while setting a new Olympic record. (As it happens, his hundred-meter dash this week would’ve only resulted in a silver medal — because the woman who won gold _was_ setting a new Olympic record — but, FWIW, his personal best in that one is faster than that gold medalist’s, as is also the case in the 400m.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-competing-against-women-in-the-olympics/947899.md?page=4)