Watching Ninja Warrior...

[SlipperyLizard]

Is surely the clearest evidence of what happens when female bodied people compete in a physical activity against male bodied people?

Spoiler alert - the female bodied people really struggle to make the cut. Even the super fit ones. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one in the final (but can’t say I have watched them all!).

It also fails to support Beth Jones’ assertion that mixed sex competition might make women try harder!

Gosh, you’re so right! The commentators comment on the heights of the contestants and the women generally don’t get beyond the first one or two obstacles because so much of it is to do with reach (let alone strength). I think I remember each country has a token two-ish women, don’t they? Interesting that no one chooses to have - full complement of women and get annihilated in every first round...

I’d much rather watch a single sex competition twice and see the women competing fairly. But we all know that makes me a hateful bigot.

Yep I’ve long thought this when watching the show. There is such a marked difference when you see the finalist scoreboards. Even the wall at the end is so telling.

The course is designed for the physicality of men.

US Ninja Warrior women:

www.quora.com/Who-are-the-top-female-American-Ninja-Warrior-competitors

Yes it would be nice to have a male female split wouldn't it so we could actually see some women and cheer for them

It’s like this if you do adventure racing. When I was very fit I did a spartan race with DH who is a runner but didn’t have the strength and conditioning I did at the time. He fared so much better on the obstacles because he could reach - 5’5” me struggled. The 30 burpee penalty for every failed obstacle always had far more women involved than men.

*The course is designed for the physicality of men"

Indeed. Why no flexibility or coordination component??

TBF some of the obstacles I've seen on various versions of Ninja Warrior are harder for very big people (most likely to be men), and there are a couple where flexibility is an advantage.

But most are designed for pure strength (particularly upper body) and the sort of explosive power that the male body is better at.

As an aside, they couldn't bring back Gladiators (again) these days, could they? Poor Jet would be pummelled by a 6'4" rugby player in the name of entertainment

Total Wipe out was the same. Only elite athlete females got through in yet you'd also get some unfit men doing it for a laugh.

I've always thought this about Ninja Warrior. Why not have 2 separate competitions over different courses? They could still air them both at the same time since they show the competitors one after another and then perhaps have 2 finals at the end of the series so it wouldn't make much difference to the length of the series for TV programming purposes.

Snuggly - because sports is still primarily a male thing and women have to fit into it. Because the only women they really want are elite athletes who wear tiny outfits - they don't want the equivalent of Brad who only signed up to do it as part of his frat initiation and whose training regime consists of lifting Domino's pizza and Miller Lite up to his mouth

It’s a shame, as my girls love the show, and it is great when a woman does well, but they’ll never see a woman win.