Bodies: Olympic Sponsorship Edition

Okay, so I am deeply bothered to learn that the strongest athlete in America, Sarah Robles, has to accept donations from her friends just to keep her head above water. Jessica Testa from Buzzfeed fills us in. Robles can lift more weight than any other American competitor (men included), but she only receives $400 monthly from U.S.A. Weightlifting. Unfortunately, "PowerBar is Robles’ only product sponsorship and her name isn’t yet big enough to land her any big special appearances." 


This is problematic, once again, because much of the reason for her lack of sponsorship is her body type. In order to lift 568 pounds, her body has to be large enough to support that. That means she's not going to look like Venus or Serena Williams, Maria Sharapova, Jennie Finch, or Abby Wambach. She has a much broader frame than any of those women. That's great for her sport, but not for getting corporate sponsorships. 


(My full wrath after the jump.)

International Olympic Committee or Gender Police?

Okay, so I know that's kind of an inflammatory headline, but this is a blog so deal with it. I honestly don't know how I feel about part of the debate around the IOC's attempt to protect women from competitors who aren't female enough by enacting new regulations that will test female competitors testosterone levels. I haven't entirely made up my mind on all of these issues so I'm going to be incredibly honest here and see if anyone is willing to do the same and share their opinions on the matter.

First off, here is the part I can readily say is bullshit: the method of testing. It turns out that testosterone is not even remotely a good marker for this type of testing. Rebecca Jordan-Young and Katrina Karkazis explained in an article for the NY Times:

Testosterone is one of the most slippery markers that sports authorities have come up with yet. Yes, average testosterone levels are markedly different for men and women. But levels vary widely depending on time of day, time of life, social status and — crucially — one’s history of athletic training. Moreover, cellular responses range so widely that testosterone level alone is meaningless.
Testosterone is not the master molecule of athleticism. One glaring clue is that women whose tissues do not respond to testosterone at all are actually overrepresented among elite athletes.
As counterintuitive as it might seem, there is no evidence that successful athletes have higher testosterone levels than less successful ones.

In case you're wondering where they got the authority to make such claims (I was curious), it appears that they coauthored a study recently published in The American Journal of Bioethics titled "Out of Bounds? A Critique of the New Policies on Hyperandrogenism in Elite Female Athletes." Full text is available here. Basically, there is no evidence that having more testosterone increases performance in athletics. 


(More info and my struggles after the jump.)