UKC

I like the Sport England "This Girl Can" campaign starting today. Kind of like the examples / ambassadors they are using. I like Grace (Cycling) with her smile, her flower on the front and her weaving around the road style.

I do, though, feel sad that the only sports which appear available to me, where I live are those you do as an individual, like cycling, or with a partner, like climbing. They use football as one of their examples and there are links to show how you can find a kick about near to you. Trouble is a) I'm a woman and b) I'm well over 18. This means that within their 20 mile search area there is no kick about for me.

It feels as though they haven't adopted the "if you book them they will come" approach and that the infrastructure isn't in place. Maybe there is an element of waiting for demand before stuff is put in place. Anyway, I am taking matters into my own hands. I have ordered a football; there is a playing field across the road from me. Not sure about my next steps but that feels like I'm doing something about it ...

I wondered what other people thought about the campaign? It feels to be about real women not super elite athletes. I don't particularly like being referred to or referring to myself at age 46 as a "girl". It smacks of tweeness and self deprecating nonsense.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

Hi Alison,
I had a look around the website the other day and whilst it doesn't come out and explicitly state this- I think it is aimed at younger women or "girls", who as a demographic have been shown to drop sport at school and never take it up again outside of school.

One of the common reasons cited for this is that getting sweaty and looking rough while exercising are not seen as cool or feminine, which explains the "do exercise and don't care if you look sweaty" message of the website. I personally found that I couldn't connect with that message, but as someone who does a lot of physical exercise, and as I clearly don't give a damn already about how I look, I'm not the target audience!

I suspect that the funding provided for this initiative is more for marketing than actually setting up new actvities and clubs for women- to try and drive support to existing clubs which are underused. I'm with you however about the toothlessness of this, particularly away from the urban centres. I think sport as a whole is underfunded in the UK with crappy facilities and when you think about how much obesity related illness costs the NHS its shocking.

However, anything that seeks to change the narrative for teenage girls is a good thing. I'm a DofE assessor and one of the most rewarding bits about my job is seeing how much fun some girls have in the great outdoors when they are liberated form mirrors and makeup.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

WRT the "Girl" thing, is this not a statement of defiance against the "Girlie" image associated with the word that we've seen historically e.g. "She can't do it because she's a girl"?

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

Could it be that the campaign is aimed at "girls" rather than 46 year old women ! Basically at your age it would be assumed you have worked it out for yourself or are beyond hope !

Football is not a great idea and your (our) but maybe investigate "walking football". I did see a Twitter post that Tranmere Rovers were doing something along those lines (cue obvious jokes) and were looking to set up a womens team as well.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

Well their marketing hadn't reached me, so I've just registered our running club. Girls, ladies, wimmin and everyone else welcome, so thanks for the pointer

In reply to Chris the Tall:


The girls featured do seem to be in the late 20s-early 30s bracket though. If the campaign is aimed more at late teens, I'm not sure how much they will identify with the mum of 3 doing workouts in her living room. Still, anything to positively change perceptions about physical activity being unfeminine is alright in my book.

In reply to SteveRi:

Prompted by this thread I've had another wander through the site and I think it is remarkably light on content and heavy on glossy images and eye candy. It's almost like it is just trying to sell an idea. I'd like to know what the target audience (18-25 year olds?) makes of it, but it could be massively improved with interactive maps of activities in your area. Its very clunky, having to search by individual sports for information- and the site mostly drives clicks to governing bodies such as the FA and BMC- not to individual clubs and local teams. By contrast the Women Climb site (which to be fair it links to) is superbly informative, full of content and inspiring. http://www.womenclimb.co.uk/

Any pedants want to commen on the Grigri technique on this page? http://www.thisgirlcan.co.uk/sport/climbing/

In reply to AlisonSmiles:


"This Girl Can is a sassy celebration of active women everywhere and proves that whatever our size, ability or previous experience, sport can be a fun and enjoyable part of our lives."

"It uses slogans such as "Sweating like a pig, feeling like a fox" and images of normal women enjoying sport.
"We want to tell the real story of women who exercise," said Sport England chief executive Jennie Price.
"They come in all shapes and sizes and all levels of ability."
The research revealed there was a significant gender gap, with two million fewer women than men in the 14-40 age range regularly participating in sport.
In other European countries, there is no disparity between men and women."

interesting the bit about Europe, although it doesn't say if the take up amongst UK men is comparable with Eurowoman. Sounds a bit like the winter climbing thread we had a while back, UK woman just not motivated like other countries.

I'm not sure about the book and they'll come approach, we have loads of similar stuff going on ATM, SE, Council, BHF etc and some of the take up is very very low ( 1 or 2 people).

If you're going to try to get a game of football it helps if there are 2 of you, that way you won't unbalance the teams, ask the bored keeper if you can join in, stay at the back and impress them with your work rate.

In reply to winhill:



Yeah that intrigues me too. As far as climbing goes, there have always been more european women involved at a high level than in the uk. This is changing now at the sport/indoor end of the climbing spectrum. Reasons cited in the past include lack of positive role models and availability of gear.

Drawing back from the picture and looking at sport as a whole- I wonder if there is any research out there on why this is the case? Anecdotally, as a UK woman who travels in europe and reads a bit I have noticed the following:

-The shrink it and pink it brigade of girl specific toys is more prevalent in the UK- creating a very specific image of femininity for girls from a young age.

-Sport in UK state schools is failing, and particularly where girls are concerned.

-The UK media focusses very heavily on mens sport, perhaps driven by the Premier League. Sportsmen are paid more and generate more column inches.

-Our weather is crap, which is discouraging (I have bitter memories of frozen hockey pitches that almost killed sport for me aged 14- now as a winter climber I hanker after turf as well frozen as that of my local park on a January morning but hey ho...)

This was a long time ago (I'm ancient) but heres an example of how badly wrong a school can get it- one of my abiding memories and the first trigger that really made me dread PE was being forced to change in the corridoor at my primary school with the boys. Aged 10, myself and some of my friends were fairly well developed and it was humilliating. I started a campaign at my school to get our own private changing area- which they did eventually. I doubt this would happen now but it still astonishes me that it was allowed in the mid 80s.

In reply to Chris the Tall:

The rather captivating "Grace" who rides bikes doesn't seem to be in the younger age category. I could picture myself eating post ride cake with her! A couple of the women who they've profiled are into their 30s.

I guess I've figured out running, cycling, and climbing. Having only moved a couple of months ago to a new area I was hopeful of a team sport with local folk!

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

There is definitely a bigger change needed to get women involved in team sports than individual ones. A few years ago Chatsworth Ladies Cricket Team were looking for local opposition and some women from my office decided to put a team together to give them a game. Having done that we decided we'd better practise a bit so we trained all summer and ended up giving them a very close game on the day and winning by a narrow margin. Feeling like we didn't want to waste all that effort, we arranged a winter training schedule for ourselves, hiring a sports hall, using a coach and working our way through a 12-step programme to cricketing greatness.

So the next summer arrives and we start looking for opposition, only to find that there is no-one else out there for us to play. We did manage to organise one game, but it got cancelled on the day due to the fact that of the opposing team, only 2 ladies showed up! I think what I'm trying to say is that getting a load of people to suddenly take up a team sport and dedicate the time to practising and then being sufficient in number not only to have a team but to have enough teams to play each other and make the whole effort worthwhile is a big challenge. Especially for a sport which girls were likely not involved with at school. Motivating people to buy a pair of trainers and get out for a run seems a lot more do-able!

In reply to Alyson:

I think there's something in that. For my own club we've had >50% women new membership. There's an appetite (the club was in decline then static for a long time) if you make an effort to be more inclusive, have a buddy up system, a graduated programme to step up gradually, clean showers. When I joined it was 'can you run 8 miles?' sink or swim, nobody answered the new member email enquiries, no social media, all very race/event focused. Some people couldn't care less about racing.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

You're are already doing 3 sports - stop being greedy !

I'm guessing the first aim would be to stop the decline in activity when girls hit their mid-teens. Just had a look at the Hallam Parkrun stats for last Saturday and out of 400 runners and 150 women, you had 7 girls under 10, another 7 11-14, but just 2 15-17. OK a small sample, but I believe it's quite representative. (Furthermore the three fastest were in the under 10 group - including the one I overtook with 1 km to go - who then sprinted past me and left me for dead !)

Since my nieces are coming up to that age, and both are energetic but overweight, I'm hoping this campaign might inspire them

The second category would be older women who are looking to take up more sport later in life. My wife for example, who was put off running at school, started a couple of years ago and now absolutely loves it. Probably need more in the way of information than inspiration

In reply to Snoweider:

You cite rubbish weather as a reason for less sport, I find hot weather makes me less inclined to excersize. If I lived on the continent, I suspect I might not do much activity in the summer months, so I don't think we can have weather as our reason here, it is used as an excuse but I don't think it's the real reason.

The 'shrink it and pink it' culture, as you put it (I liked that phrase a lot!) I suspect doesn't help.

I don't know where my friend got this information from, but she has read into this subject a lot has her daughter is 10, and she is worried about her daughter drifting away from excersize. She has found research that says that if girls have a uniform for PE rather than being allowed to wear their own kit then it keeps girls participating more. I'm not sure the reason, but an interesting bit of research.

Some local schools here have started introducing things like dance for PE, as it is something that the girls are more likely to keep up when the leave school, so it will be interesting to see if that does have an effect.

I suspect, like many of these issues, there are many factors contributing to the trend.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:


Trampolines need teams to use them safely. You could learn to do back flips and somersaults?

Those two things have always looked like fun to me (I hope to be able to do them by the time I'm 40). Good luck in your search.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

Well they launched the ad, and I like it a lot more than I like the website!

youtube.com/watch?v=aN7lt0CYwHg&

Still seems like an advert for an idea though?

In reply to Alyson:


What is wrong with aiming at that age group, what do you have against them?

In reply to stroppygob:

Not even close

In reply to Timmd:

I seem to have messed about with a lot of stuff in my time - did a ten week evening course in trampolining, couldn't quite get to a somersault without the teacher having some kind of scarf looped around my waist to haul me back in when it looked like my landing was going awry. Enjoyed it though. Swimming another sport easy to do on your own in your own time I guess.

As Chris the Tall says - there's this <older> age bracket of women who stopped doing stuff and for whatever reason have the motivation or the time to look around them again and get active, trouble is, the whole circle of contacts that do that kind of thing has somewhat slimmed down by that time and takes a bit to rebuild / find if you don't always want to do the solitary activities.

Hopefully my football will arrive shortly. Might get a few cones and find myself dribbling the ball around the local playing field. If I'm joined by a couple of ten year olds and a dad (or mum for the purposes of avoiding gender bias), that'll do me.

In reply to girlymonkey:

>> if girls have a uniform for PE rather than being allowed to wear their own kit then it keeps girls participating more.

Oh gawd, I remember the uniform PE skirt. So short you had to have uniform navy knickers underneath as well (yes, the PE mistress used to check), very ... erm ... character building .... when doing a cross-country run round a public park. Why they couldn't have just let us wear proper shorts I have no idea!

In reply to Wingnut:

Oh gawd, I remember the uniform PE skirt.

I remember those too...

In reply to FactorXXX:

I remember them too. Pleats and a flat panel and some weird clip thing which meant you wore the same skirt from the age of 11 to 16. Grey, ours were, and the gym knickers which you had to sew vertical ribbons in house colours down the side. The gym knickers also somehow served you from 11 to 16 years old. The only bits of school uniform I got new instead of hand me downs from my big sister as she was still wearing her originals. The advantage is that it was really levelling; you didn't get disparity between those who would otherwise no doubt have turned up in designer stuff or <little outfits> in fashion model style. We all had to look like sacks of spuds together. I feel the knee high sock combo was particularly flattering.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

>> I feel the knee high sock combo was particularly flattering.

Yep, especially when teamed with cheap canvas hockey boots and knees slowly turning blue with cold.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:


I think it is that levelling that means that girls stay involved. I think just basic shorts and t-shirts would have the same effect, as long as they are all the same and not particularly fashionable.

In reply to girlymonkey:

Definitely. I'd have been pretty disadvantaged in the fashion and pricey clothing stakes and that would have felt somewhat humiliating I suspect. Things were already pretty bad with my home made pass me down school uniform in honesty. At least during PE we all looked the same.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

I was never bothered by the fashion followers, I found teenage girls generally pretty objectionable and hung around with boys most of my teenage years!! So it never really affected me, I just kept my head down in PE, and hung around with one or two other geeky types.
Now I work with lots of teenagers, I can see that looking uncool in PE could really discourage some from participating. I feel there is a whole cultural shift which needs to happen around this, but in the mean time if we can reduce the issue of image conciousness by not letting them have an image then I guess it could only be a good thing.

In reply to Dr.S at work:


Soz mate, it was a mild ribbing of Alyson who seems to think out of context quoting is ok.

In reply to stroppygob:

yes I know, hence my comment.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:
Interesting adjunct to this story. I'm not sure I bbeliev that its as much cause and effect as they suggest - thoughts? I don't remember any girls in my class showering after PE, we had open plan showers and theres no way teenage girls are going to use them! It certainly never factored into how much effort I put in to PE.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-30796304

In reply to girlymonkey:
'we had open plan showers and theres no way teenage girls are going to use them!'

Well, there's one of my teenage fantasies totally blown away then

In reply to girlymonkey:

We also had open plan showers and it wasn't a choice whether you got to use them or not. Showering was not optional.

In reply to girlymonkey:

I can say with some certainty that teenage girls don't shower after PE, given the stench in our house when my daughter comes home from school.

You have to applaud efforts to get anyone engaged in physical activity, but I have to say that some of the reasons given for girls not doing it seem pretty pathetic to me, such that it makes me question whether they are reasons or excuses.

If it works though, great.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

I've been going to British Military Fitness (BMF) for nearly 8 years now. Throughout that time my primary local park in Kent has been around 50/50 male and female, with age ranges also pretty well balanced from early 20s to late 40s with one or two of us real oldsters in out late 50s. Both sexes do the same exercises and reps, graded by bib colour rather than sex, and there are as many women in the "top" bib grade as there are men.

Today's turnout had slightly more women. Our Sunday morning turnouts tend to be at least 50/50 and the weekday morning sessions that run in summer tend to be around 70% female.

The alternative park I attend when travelling for work, in Devon, is almost invariably 65+% female on the evening sessions I attend.

Everyone sweats like pigs, rolls around in the mud and gets filthy. I was a bit surprised when I first joined to see such a high proportion of females, as I'd come from indoor circuits and gym sessions where men predominated, and the BMF experience was much more "down and dirty" (as well as harder) than those things. Also, I'd have thought the "Military" in the title might put off a lot of women. Seems not.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:


Sorry Alison but I don't think they're interested in you. The campaign appears to be squarely aimed at the "don't exercise" group, and only at the "could be persuaded" end of that group too. Clearly you already exercise so as far as this campaign is concerned it's job done already.
If you read the background material you'll see that they've identified a number of reasons why women who might otherwise exercise don't actually do it. The campaign is aimed at shooting down those reasons in the hope that women who would quite like to do something will actually make it happen.
There would be no point in using super elite athletes or indeed models for the campaign as they need women to see it as something they themselves can achieve. I don't think it's got anything to do with age either - other than a possible connection between age and non-sporting lifestyle.

Must admit though I can see how some women might be put off by the term "girl". Too often it's used in a negative sense as in "runs like a girl". Maybe they're playing on that ironically, if so it's a bit too subtle for me.

In reply to csambrook:




I agree, which is why I never bought into the Olympic legacy thing.

In reply to csambrook:


Did anyone complain that the "hello boys" wonder bra campaign was derogatory to men? Should the Spice Girls have been the Spice Ladies ?

Yes, I think it's aimed as a rebuttal to those, like Sir Bradley of Wiggins, who used 'like a girl' in a negative sense. (In fairness, he quickly corrected himself)

In reply to ebygomm:

If we told the teacher we had our period we got let off showers. Blooming things were freezing. We used to line up and run through the gamut of showers making sure we were able to show that the ends of our hair were wet thus "proving" we'd showered.

In reply to AlisonSmiles:

Have you tried Woodley for football? It can't be more that 6 miles from you - I've only been there once but I saw plenty of women playing football. Maybe they have some sort of introductory thing?