I love female athletes. I get such a high from watching women compete. Somewhere in the back of my head, I can still hear Dad's voice . . . "Back in my days men wouldn't care for a woman with legs like yours. Too many muscles . . . It just doesn't look right." But listening to Marion Jones weep and confess after all of her bold claims of innocence was so depressing. Those performance enhancing drugs, I believe, are here to stay. Sad.
Also sad to see are the number of anorexic runners, like the girl on Suzanne's team who couldn't believe that Suzanne didn't mind being "fat." Her coach told me once that he couldn't allow some of his faster runners to compete in the steeple chase or the longer track races because they didn't eat enough, over-trained and generally didn't take care of their bodies. Female runners, he said, have a higher injury rate than football players.
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3 comments:
i love to watch female soccer players and softball players on t.v. you don't realize how unusual it is to see women of normal weight and who aren't being sexualized on t.v., until you flip one of these on. i'm surprised every time by just how surprise i am.
Wow. I know you must be proud of your girl for willing to be "fat." Sounds like she has a good head on her shoulders, as well as trained muscles in her healthy body. It's gotta be really hard to resist that sort of group insanity that overtakes girls at that age.
I've been a runner for several years and nutrition is so important. I never competed in running in HS, but I had friends who were terribly thing and also weren't allowed to do the longer runs b/c the coach was worried they would collapse and die right on the course. Any long distance runners, especially, have the highest injury rate of any sport out there, which is why, of course, the right nutrition (and amount) is so vital. Wow, I totally just sounded like such a nerdaholic. But I think about this issue a lot :)
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