Why do less women cycle? A look round the women's section of any cycling store suggests there a very few of us out there!
The cycling store problem is a bit chicken-and-egg - women find little nice cycling gear so they stop going to those stores so women going there find little nice gear and so on. I also suspect that a higher proportion of women cycle in ordinary clothes rather than full spandex suits, but that's guesswork.
As for why fewer women cycle, the last solid evidence I saw was in British Cycling's Vision for Women which said:
Over 30% of female respondents to a recent British Cycling survey identified safety concerns as the main barrier to participating in cycling.
The other most common responses were:
‘lack of knowledge of local routes’
‘nobody to go with’.
In addition, through our research and intelligence gained from the delivery of our programmes to date, we understand there are a number of additional barriers which challenge women specifically
from participating in cycling:
Lack of time
Lack of confidence on a bike and cycling on the highway
Lack of female role models, eg ride leaders
Lack of knowledge of bike maintenance and associated vulnerabilities
Negative body image associated with kit, equipment and resultant ‘muscular’ physique
Costs associated with purchase of bike
Impracticalities of bike transportation.
In terms of the barriers preventing women progressing to challenge rides and racing, we know the visibility and understanding of these opportunities need to improve. That is why we are campaigning to create a safe and enjoyable cycling environment for everyone.
I can't link to that because it seems that
www.BritishCycling.org.uk/women seems to have been deleted!
Somehow British Cycling got from the above list to the Breeze single-sex rides (where you can be out of place if you're not wearing a helmet and lycra and riding a racing bike) which I think do little to address most of those but that's a whole other discussion. I'm more in favour of a Stourbug-style approach: encouraging women but primarily addressing things like safety concerns, routes, friendly people to ride with, offering some mechanical support if it all goes wrong, not requiring special kit or fancy bikes and offering tips on practical cycling (yes, you can do a group ride with baskets and/or panniers!). Most of those barriers affect other under-represented groups too.
Why is women's pro cycling not as big a deal as mens? Is it ultimately down to speed? I understand and accept that men are generally faster/stronger than women but surely if you're competing against women and you're the strongest thats the same as men competing against men?
I think it's mainly that the history means it's playing catch-up. I really enjoy the women's pro cycling as much as the men's, but it doesn't get as much coverage and so it doesn't get as many resources and so it isn't such a big show (no big screen fan-zones at the Women's Tour of Britain as far as I've seen) and so it doesn't get as much coverage... There are some daft rules about race lengths and so on which I think should be changed soon, too. The great opportunity for women's racing is that they can try to build a calendar that avoids the overlapping chaos of the men's racing.
The profile is being raised though, and things are improving. Long may that continue.
.
