Triathlon – Leading the way in parity of sexes
Triathlon is in the fortunate position of having sprung up in a time when parity of sexes was more balanced, comparative to other sports, which are steeped in a long history of sexism.
Nonetheless, there is a lesson to be learnt for leaders in other sports that women will be more inclined to filter into sports that demonstrate equality like triathlon, where they know their professional role models are held with the same respect as male counterparts. A sport where event availability is equal and there is a large field of competition and comradery to be found. Triathlon is a sport where both sexes can see their own gender at the top of their game live on TV.
Prize money is equal in triathlon and World Triathlon has announced a landmark $1 million (£719,300/€842,000) for the 2022 Championship Series Rankings, that will be equally distributed between male and female athletes.
Prize money has always been equal in triathlon – in fact some years ago, Bejing Olympic Cycling Silver Medallist, Emma Pooley famously told reporters that she won more money coming third in a half-Ironman in the Philippines than she ever did in the dozens of bike races she won in her career.
Although not all pay-outs are quite equal to triathletes, you have to win to gain the lion’s share of the prize-pot and in this respect the onset of the commercial venture of Super League Triathlon Championships 2021 brought in some well-deserved prize money for the British golden girls of the Tokyo Olympic Team Rely, Jess Learmonth and Georgina Taylor-Brown.
These two dominated the list of athletes earning the most prize money from the series taking home a total of $276,000 between them. Whilst Learmonth just missed out on the SLT trophy in the final race, her three previous race wins, the bike jersey and being a member of the title winning team took her prize-pot to $136,000 only $4,000 shy of the championship winner, her friend and team-mate Taylor-Brown.
The ladies prize-pots outshone their male Olympic Gold Medallist teammates of Alex Yee and Johnny Brownlee. Yee who won the Men’s SLT championship trophy pocketed $120,000 whilst Brownlee who came third overall lay claim to $73,000. The men’s prize-pot being more evenly distributed between their rivals who claimed wins and jersey payments during the series.
These prizes may give a better understanding of why in certain sports, elite female athletes feel undervalued because of gender disparity. For instance, while all cycling disciplines have been paid equal at World Championships level since 2013, many road races still have disparities.
This differential was once again highlighted at February’s 2021 Omloop Het Nieuwsblad where men’s champion Davide Ballerini won 16,000 euros (£13,766) whilst Dutch Olympic and Womens World Road Race Champion Anna van der Breggen won 930 euros (£800) for winning the women’s race.
Given that many of the women are on one-year contracts within a professional cycling team they have to be careful of what they say as it can really inhibit their chances of getting another contract. Nevertheless, the general message this sends out to the female fraternity is we don’t value you as racers as much as we value the male riders, and we think that your achievement is worth less than the men’s achievement.
Triathlon ought to be held up as the golden beacon to the counter-arguments given by many sports federations that women’s sport is not watched as much, it’s not as well seen, it’s not as well viewed and it’s not thought of on the same level. Who of use were not memorised by Bermuda’s Olympic hero Flora Duffy, the first triathlete ever to win Olympic gold and the Triathlon World Championship in the same year and awarded a Damehood in the Queen’s New Year’s Honours List 2022 to boot.
It not just races that is the biggest win in triathlons parity of sexes. The emergence of women in key leadership roles within the triathlon industry over the last decade has been a crucial factor, notably under Marisol Casado’s leadership as President of the World Triathlon Federation, one of the only three female Presidents of International Sports Federations. This Spanish woman has been for many years one of the greater role models for the sport community when it comes to gender balance in an organisation where gender equity is at the core of its constitution. As a powerful advocate of having a strong ratio of women who sit on Executive Board, she also worked tirelessly on having another medal event at the Olympic Games with the Mixed Relay making its debut in Tokyo with both genders competing
Marisol Casado, has been appointed by the International Olympic Committee President to five Commissions: Women in Sport, Olympic Solidarity, Public Affairs and Social Development Through Sport, Coordination Commission of the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad in Paris 2024 and Coordination Commission of the Games of the XXXIV Olympiad in Los Angeles 2028. Last October Casado was appointed as a new member of the Future Host Commissions for the Games of the Olympiad and the Olympic Winter Games of the International Olympic Committee (IOC). In addition, she is a member of the ASOIF Council and Treasurer of the Global Association of International Sports Federations (GAISF).
It is through such powerful platforms that the female voice can be truly heard, empowering them to increase female participation and promote the parity of sexes within the sporting arena.
In today’s age, we should be able to remove the barriers that have maintained a status quo for longer than we want to admit and together focus on one of the foundational pillars of sport: fairness.
