Advice please “Ladies Award”

[SheilaMT]

I would like some advice please. My partner has asked my opinion and I and am asking yours! He runs a grass roots motor sport event which is open to both men and women. Various trophies are awarded in various classes and there is also an overall trophy for the fastest time of the day. These awards are open to all. There is also an award for the fastest time of the day by a woman. Is this promoting women or is it patronising? Should this continue to be an award? If so what should it be called?

I would split the awards into 3 categories:

1. Overall
2. Men
3. Women

Hopefully then everyone is happy!

Ladies is twee and patronising. Women - yes it absolutely should be celebrated that a woman has excelled in a traditionally male dominated field. Also, have some ground rules about who is eligible for this award.

Given it's motorsport, so skill rather than strength, potentially patronising... do women always finish after men, as in some physical sports, or is it more even? If all women don't regularly finish after men then no need for a separate prize I would think.

Depends on whether being female is a disadvantage. If it is then a separate recognition is a good thing.

I have worked in motorsport and I don't think it's patronising. Women need more visibility and a level playing field. There's enough rich misogynist old pricks all over that industry as it is, he should continue to carve out a space for women.

Women need to be celebrated and uplifted in motorsport. It's not patronising at all.

Idk anything about motorsport (it's something to do with cars, right? 😀) but if possible it might be useful to give some context for the winners. I imagine some of the men may have more resources/time for the sport and the women less - so if the male winners are generally driving 40 hours a week in a car they own and can pay a mechanic to be on call, or have been doing this continuously since they were a teen, and the female winners are fitting driving round work/childcare, don't have a car for their own personal use and started later in life, that would give some context to their scores. Partic if - my hopefully incorrect assumption - the women's times are generally lower than the men's.

There are enough sexed differences in both performance and participation to warrant a female category:

https://www.autosport.com/general/news/how-the-gender-performance-gap-is-hindering-womens-progress-in-motorsport/10528462/

If in 5-10 years the overall fastest prize has been awarded to women on several occasions, then the women’s prize could be argued as unnecessary. Until then, keep it, as it’s a good way to encourage female participation.

It's pretty taxing usually. Nothing like normal driving. I recently went outdoor go carting on the ones that go 60mph and had totally forgotten how much your arms hurt afterwards. And I'm very strong for a woman. Can deadlift 140kg and squat 110.

Call it Women's and not Ladies, and ensure that it is not open to anyone other than biological women.

Do women win the main award roughly proportionally to their participation and level of experience?

Do women's times roughly correspond to men's times when experience level is similar?

Are there barriers to participation and development opportunities in the sport at this level which might plausibly affect women more, and mean that a women's award would encourage and recognise the additional effort involved?

It should be called the Women's Award and should be qualified for based on sex not gender.