I would love to see a woman in F1 but...

[CMSMJ1]

On the physicality: The lack of power steering is definitely a problem in lower formulae and the sideways G's will be a problem in F1. In military jets the G's are always working with the skeleton; not so in F1 where you need massive neck muscles. Even the brake pedal forces I think are a problem - over 150kg I believe. For two hours at many corners on a track - that would be one strong woman.

This is the problem for me. Power steering is one factor but how many of you want to see a woman driving an F1 car in high level with a neck like HULK as all the drivers have?

It matters not whether a woman has any "look" at all - that is sailing so close to the line that tries to define a woman into a certain aesthetic and isn't a valid argument against competition.

I have watched most of the indy NXT races this year - there were several women who competed over the season - some were fast and won races and others were not so fast and were not at the pointy end.

I would like to see Jamie Chadwick get a chance in Indy proper - I think she could win races, not many, but that would be her level and of the active women she does seem to be acheiving more than the W series/F1 Academy allows.

On the neck - were a young woman able to progress through the ranks, on merit, and with support - I see no reason that she could not be strong enough. It would be very good to see it - but F1 is hard enough so this would have to be a generational talent indeed.

[hollus]

I would love to see a woman in F1

Care to elaborate why, by the way?

[mwillems]

Well, women seem to do mighty good in sports practiced on top of a horse, so I’d argue that once you remove muscle-strength / weight ratio as a key factor, things get much more equal.
Crucially F1 with power steering and drive by wire does that (huge on endurance, though), but lesser formulas do not.

Is there any study comparing male athletes to female athletes on reflexes?
Or on jet fighter pilot performance at 4-5 G?

If you fancy a read...

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/P ... or%20women.

And a general peruse of the internet suggests the mean average shows men to be faster in reacting than women with 10-20ms in it. But the mean average will be less relevant at the pinnacle of motorsport, as the peaks for those that are the very best are more relevant, you'd think?

But I don't think it is just reaction times. What are Alonso's reaction times vs Stroll? I'd be surprised if there was an advantage, nor that Alonso's advantage comes from physical conditioning. It might be the case, but at his age the difference comes from elsewhere I think. There is something way more substantial in your cranium relating to pure compute power that I think really makes the difference. Some drivers will have anticipated what they might be about to react to, for example. Like in many sports, that anticipation is highly valuable.

You might also find that the differences at a younger age are more relevant than differences between Adult men and women as it would feel like the real difference is about how women can enter the sport.

[hollus]

Data! So refreshing, thanks!

Results
The mean fastest reaction times were 23 ms shorter in men than women (166 ms vs 189 ms, respectively; F(1,409) = 108.846; p<0.001; Fig. 1). The lower bounds of the 99% confidence intervals were 118 ms for men and 131 ms for women.

At the 99.9% confidence level, neither men nor women can react in 100 ms, but they can react in as little as 109 ms and 121 ms, respectively. However, that sex difference in reaction time is likely an artifact caused by using the same force threshold in women as men, and it permits a woman to false start by up to 21 ms without penalty. We estimate that female sprinters would have similar reaction times to male sprinters if the force threshold used at Beijing was lowered by 22% in order to account for their lesser muscle strength.

As usual trying to compare apples to apples is more complicated than it looks, and assumptions need to creep in.

Still reading, I might add more snippets from that paper later.

[mwillems]

Data! So refreshing, thanks!

Results
The mean fastest reaction times were 23 ms shorter in men than women (166 ms vs 189 ms, respectively; F(1,409) = 108.846; p<0.001; Fig. 1). The lower bounds of the 99% confidence intervals were 118 ms for men and 131 ms for women.

At the 99.9% confidence level, neither men nor women can react in 100 ms, but they can react in as little as 109 ms and 121 ms, respectively. However, that sex difference in reaction time is likely an artifact caused by using the same force threshold in women as men, and it permits a woman to false start by up to 21 ms without penalty. We estimate that female sprinters would have similar reaction times to male sprinters if the force threshold used at Beijing was lowered by 22% in order to account for their lesser muscle strength.

As usual trying to compare apples to apples is more complicated than it looks, and assumptions need to creep in.

Still reading, I might add more snippets from that paper later.

Interesting, so the peaks show a greater disparity. But it needs to be remembered that that study is at the mercy of its subject group size and demographic, though the 425 sprinters at the Beijing Olympics seems pretty strong evidence, but it is possible that the numbers are narrower, or wider, when averaged across a few more olympic summers, for instance.

Having a general search demonstrates that there are also differences in the way the bodies react between visual and audible stimuli. I'd imagine it would be the same for the physical stimuli too. The study you are reading is about reaction times of sprinters so therefore reaction to an audible event. Race drivers are more likely to rely in visual and physical events than audible, though it will certainly be part of it.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4456887/

And this about visuomotor tracking between sexes.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-68069-0

[Rodak]

Well, we Americans seem more welcoming of female drivers; CART and IndyCar certainly have had a few. When I was racing FF1600 there were three woman drivers in our region and they drove pretty well. When my daughter was of age I offered to get her going in racing, but she had no interest and I didn't push.

[TimW]

Even the brake pedal forces I think are a problem - over 150kg I believe.

Any reason why they have to be 150 kg?
Isn’t that just how the BBW has been calibrated for a man that can (but rarely does, grip limitations!) produce those 150 kg of force?

I always assumed it is desireable to have it high because of the high deceleration. At 4g deceleration your leg gets quite heavy. I think you would lack feel of you only have like 20kg of brake pedal force. You would need to pull your leg up because from the deceleration alone your foot would push more than that.

[hollus]

From the last article by mwillems:

Conclusion:
The ART is faster than the VRT in medical students. Furthermore, male medical students have faster RTs as compared to female medical students for both auditory as well as visual stimuli. Regularly exercising medical students have faster RTs when compared with medical students with sedentary lifestyles.

The latest sentence can of course either be cause or effect, possibly both.

Slower reaction times would certainly be a hindrance at any top level sport.

[Jackuar]

Well, women seem to do mighty good in sports practiced on top of a horse, so I’d argue that once you remove muscle-strength / weight ratio as a key factor, things get much more equal.
Crucially F1 with power steering and drive by wire does that (huge on endurance, though), but lesser formulas do not.

Chess comes first to my mind. Nothing muscle there but women are still quite some distance off vs elite men.

[Greg Locock]

The https://www.chess.com/players rankings are a good way of squashing some politically correct notions, and the barriers to entry are not high, especially now that you can play on the internet.

[fourmula1]

The https://www.chess.com/players rankings are a good way of squashing some politically correct notions, and the barriers to entry are not high, especially now that you can play on the internet.

Drrr Dummmm Errrm Williams hAs FasTest Top speed thEY must be the fastest team. DurrRR

[Hoffman900]

On the physicality: The lack of power steering is definitely a problem in lower formulae and the sideways G's will be a problem in F1. In military jets the G's are always working with the skeleton; not so in F1 where you need massive neck muscles. Even the brake pedal forces I think are a problem - over 150kg I believe. For two hours at many corners on a track - that would be one strong woman.

This is the problem for me. Power steering is one factor but how many of you want to see a woman driving an F1 car in high level with a neck like HULK as all the drivers have?

Women compete in MMA, boxing, and Roman Greco wrestling, where neck strength is as or more important than F1 drivers. This is a non issue. Everything F1 drivers do, people in those sports have been doing forever… the movements and training routines all came from there.

Leg strength is also a non-issue. Spend any amount of time around collegiate women rugby players, field hockey players, rowers, and competitive Olympic weight lifters and it’s a non issue. Hell my gym has several 30 something moms who compete in powerlifting and oly lifting competitions as hobbyists and can back squat north of 115kg, some of them run pretty decent 5k times on top of that too.

F1 drivers have fantastic endurance and quick reflexes, but this elite physical thing is a bit hype and self aggrandizing. For example, I have had friends who have raced against Bottas on bicycles as hobbyists. And while Bottas is extremely fit and fast on a bike, my friends who are serious amatuer cyclists still beat him. That’s not to say they can drive a F1 car because they can’t. Having seen Bottas in person, I would have no problem beating him in a weight room and an arm wrestling competition, and I am hardly elite. It’s just different.

Furthermore, every F1 driver who steps into Indy Car has to bulk up with muscle to handle the lack of power steering and the longer races, and women have competed there.

The thing with F1 is it takes a lot of money. I see $30mil investment floating around a kart > F2 career, and the reality is half the F1 grid brings in their own sponsors on top of that. So for F1 it’s not a problem of women can’t do it, it’s a matter of numbers. You need enough women with $30mil behind them, that one breaks through the other guys with that behind them.

Remember, a lot of the drivers come from wealthy families (Stroll, Norris), or they get support from manufacturers (Lewis, Oscar, Charles), or wealthy sugar daddies (Perez), or psuedo government backing (Albon), or whatever academy system they’re in (RB). None of these guys are solely there on their “elite athleticism”. There is some natural innate talent as wheelman and reflexes, but the rest of it is how much money they’ve had invested in them via track time, equipment, coaching, etc.

[Hoffman900]

The https://www.chess.com/players rankings are a good way of squashing some politically correct notions, and the barriers to entry are not high, especially now that you can play on the internet.

Again, a numbers game. With way less participants, you have less genetic outliers, and these outliers are freak show grandmasters. Add in a strong incel like sexism in the chess world, and you won’t see women picking up that sport en-masse because they don’t want to be around that, so you’ll never have the numbers.

[peewon]

The https://www.chess.com/players rankings are a good way of squashing some politically correct notions, and the barriers to entry are not high, especially now that you can play on the internet.

Again, a numbers game. With way less participants, you have less genetic outliers, and these outliers are freak show grandmasters. Add in a strong incel like sexism in the chess world, and you won’t see women picking up that sport en-masse because they don’t want to be around that, so you’ll never have the numbers.

Ive heard the sexism as a deterrent argument regarding chess many times but while it may be a contributing factor, it in no way explains lack of women participating in online events. Or the fact the other industries rife with much worse sexism like music and films have absolutely no dearth of women flocking to get involved in them.

The elephant in the room is that chess is simply not an attractive avenue for women or men. It takes years of dedication and hard work with very little pay off for almost 95% of the players. Enough men, for various reasons, anthropological or otherwise, still end up participating.

Ill also push back against the notion that you need to be a "genetic freak" to be a grandmaster. Polgar sisters are a perfect example why. If someone is unaware about their story, their parents dedicated to training them in chess from a young age as an experiment to show that nurture matters more than nature. Now it would be highly improbable that they simply lucked into birthing genetic freaks. Instead a more likely explanation is that girls, when fully committed to chess from a young age and persisting for years, can reach the same heights.

[bluechris]

On the physicality: The lack of power steering is definitely a problem in lower formulae and the sideways G's will be a problem in F1. In military jets the G's are always working with the skeleton; not so in F1 where you need massive neck muscles. Even the brake pedal forces I think are a problem - over 150kg I believe. For two hours at many corners on a track - that would be one strong woman.

This is the problem for me. Power steering is one factor but how many of you want to see a woman driving an F1 car in high level with a neck like HULK as all the drivers have?

Women compete in MMA, boxing, and Roman Greco wrestling, where neck strength is as or more important than F1 drivers. This is a non issue. Everything F1 drivers do, people in those sports have been doing forever… the movements and training routines all came from there.

Leg strength is also a non-issue. Spend any amount of time around collegiate women rugby players, field hockey players, rowers, and competitive Olympic weight lifters and it’s a non issue. Hell my gym has several 30 something moms who compete in powerlifting and oly lifting competitions as hobbyists and can back squat north of 115kg, some of them run pretty decent 5k times on top of that too.

F1 drivers have fantastic endurance and quick reflexes, but this elite physical thing is a bit hype and self aggrandizing. For example, I have had friends who have raced against Bottas on bicycles as hobbyists. And while Bottas is extremely fit and fast on a bike, my friends who are serious amatuer cyclists still beat him. That’s not to say they can drive a F1 car because they can’t. Having seen Bottas in person, I would have no problem beating him in a weight room and an arm wrestling competition, and I am hardly elite. It’s just different.

Furthermore, every F1 driver who steps into Indy Car has to bulk up with muscle to handle the lack of power steering and the longer races, and women have competed there.

The thing with F1 is it takes a lot of money. I see $30mil investment floating around a kart > F2 career, and the reality is half the F1 grid brings in their own sponsors on top of that. So for F1 it’s not a problem of women can’t do it, it’s a matter of numbers. You need enough women with $30mil behind them, that one breaks through the other guys with that behind them.

Remember, a lot of the drivers come from wealthy families (Stroll, Norris), or they get support from manufacturers (Lewis, Oscar, Charles), or wealthy sugar daddies (Perez), or psuedo government backing (Albon), or whatever academy system they’re in (RB). None of these guys are solely there on their “elite athleticism”. There is some natural innate talent as wheelman and reflexes, but the rest of it is how much money they’ve had invested in them via track time, equipment, coaching, etc.

You didn't read what i wrote, i didn't express the feeling that they cannot compete, i said that they will need to be like Hulk's if they reach this level exactly as they look in the sport's that you mentioned.
I personally don't like that and i am not sexist because i don't wanna see woman's like this.