Elite women athletes called 'fat' by senior UK Athletics officials

[FairPhyllis]

The Telegraph is reporting that the heptathletes Jessica Ennis and Louise Hazel have been criticised by senior people within UK Athletics for being fat. This comes the day after former world junior triathlon champion Hollie Avil announced her retirement following an eating disorder. FFS! How hard and utterly depressing must it be to be a woman athlete if your own governing body snipes about you to your coach?

I also see that the BOA is trying to get athletes at the Olympics to sign a good behaviour contract - perhaps officials at UK Athletics should be forced to sign an agreement that they won't spend the build-up to a massively important championship maliciously attacking their own women athletes and disrupting their preparation?

[piprabbit]

Podgy? Really?

[Want2bSupermum]

I wonder when that picture was taken because he wasn't looking anything like that. It might be that he gains the weight when he isn't training but he was def on the podgy side. Not fat but more body fat that you would expect and far more than what is shown in that picture.

[ArielThePiraticalMermaid]

Jess's dad is Jamaican isn't he? Not that that has anything to do with anything.

And at 5 ft 4, she equalled the British Women's high jump record in 2007. I find that simply astonishing. How could she possible have done that if she was carrying excess weight?

[piprabbit]

As the picture was taken as a series of portraits for the Olympics, it will probably have been in the last 3months as I don't suppose the team was selected until this year.

[Want2bSupermum]

I saw him in 2009 in Baltimore (at a burger place). He was with his mother and a couple of other people. He was wearing a long sleve tshirt and jeans. As I said, you could tell he was muscular but after seeing pictures of him at the Beijing Olympics I was expecting him to be more muscular and less 'soft' around the edges.

[AvengingGerbil]

If all our female athletes were not required to perform their sports in their underwear by the 'fashion designers' who think that it is essential for the women to reveal as much flesh as possible while the men are allowed to wear garments that cover them, perhaps fewer people would feel entitled to comment constantly on their appearances. But of course, women athletes' appearance is more important (to sponsors? the media? the viewers?) than their skill and performance.

[ArielThePiraticalMermaid]

Remember UK Badminton trying to force women to wear tiny skirts instead of shorts in order to attract more audiences? The players quite rightly told them to fuck off. I wish women tennis players had their principles - sadly not. One of the reasons Justine Henin wore a cap pulled over her face was because she was embarrassed about her appearance compared to the blonde clones from Eastern Europe. What a huge shame that was - that one of the finest of women players felt she had to do that because of the revolting beauty ethic in women's tennis :(

[evilgiraffe]

Nothing really to add to what everyone else has said, but thought I'd stick my name on this thread - I am absolutely appalled at this. I'll be cheering extra hard for Jessica Ennis now, and I hope that the "official" who made these comments gets outed. It's a disgrace, and what a shame to have the Olympics tarnished by such idiotic nonsense.

[AbigailAdams]

Oh this is sickening if not slightly unsurprising. The sport I work in has a section where the women (and men) need to be under a certain weight. The women routinely miss their periods and have issues with food (far more so than with the men because women have the twin pressures of the sport and society judging them on what they weigh/look like). In whose world is it OK for women to regularly miss menstruation because they aren't eating enough for the amount of exercise they are doing?

On a more anecdotal note, the sport has a chat forum where 90% of the comments about the women's side of the sport is derogatory, generally including remarks about looks/weight.

I find it very sad that other sports are similar in their sexism.

[lostmywellies]

I think she'd be a better athlete if she dyed her hair blonde.

Well, really.

[DashingRedhead]

I think some pointless misogynistic wanker thinks that the best physique for a female athlete is the same as Kate Moss or some other complete waste of oxygen.

You'd think they'd have grasped the difference between athletic and skinny by now.

[malinois]

Describing her as 'fat' is disgraceful and unprofessional - and plain wrong, at a guess she has no more than 14% bodyfat - I've seen her in person and she's a walking block of muscle.

Perhaps he was just clumsily saying that she is carrying too much (lean) mass? Obviously a heptathlete is always going to carry more weight than a marathon runner, otherwise the shot, javelin and jumps are going to suffer. Jess is quite small and her astonishing performance in the events where taller women would have a natural advantage is down to her power - she NEEDS that muscle mass to perform.

In any case, her success at Gotzis shows the official up for the fool he is.

[UnimaginitiveDadThemedUsername]

It probably was a man who said the two athletes were 'fat', but as the gender of the UK Athletics official wasn't reported there is the outside chance that it wasn't.

In any case, I think the person in question should be made public so we can examine their level of success in athletics. I suspect it's some creepy overweight man who never even won his school's egg-and-spoon race, but it would be nice to know for certain.

[NicholasTeakozy]

Lostmywellies :o:o:o

Malinois, you put it so much more eloquently than I did upthread.

Louise is one for the future I think. I have a feeling she'll carry on the fine tradition of UK Heptathletes like Denise Lewis, the just retired (through injury) Kelly Sotherton and Jess herself.

[CleverHans]

I remember reading in "it's not about the bike"" Lance Armstrong's autobiography that cyclist's partners knew that they were nearing the Tour de France when they could see their internal organs. I have to admit I thought then that some athletes have to push themselves too hard and too far in the race to succeed. Jessica Ennis is I think inspirational and a fabulous athlete.

On another point, could someone please let me know if it's "cyclist's partners, cylist's partner's, cylists partner's or cyclists partners?" aargh

[Longtalljosie]

How many cyclists are there?

[AThingInYourLife]

"So basically some bloke has said he doesn't fancy her. That's what it boils down to isn't it. Nothing to do with how good at she is at her sport, he has had a look and decided she would please him more if she was thinner."

:o

I've been reading utterly befuddled that anyone could say those women were fat and now it all makes sense.

Thanks, Sardine :)

[LobstersLass]

Cyclists' partners.

I think!

[tribpot]

That's right - the partners of cyclists, cyclists' partners. Still rather (barf face not envy face) at being able to see internal organs.