Kettlebell Sport
Ranks and the Gender Gap
In America, many more women than men are hitting CMS and MS
rank. These men and women are
exceptional athletes, and are to be commended for years of dedication to their
training. However, I have often wondered
why so many more women than men are making high ranks. Over the last few years, the disproportionate
nature of this attainment has become more and more evident. I'd like to know why. In this brief article, I examine some indicators of the performance gap between men and women in sports similar to kettlebell sport, and the way this gap is reflected in ranking requirements.
The stock answer to the question of why more women than men are earning high ranks is that many of the women entering
the sport of Kettlebell lifting do not come from strength training backgrounds,
so they rely more on efficient technique than the men. Men tend to try to muscle
the weights around, while women tend to use technique to let physics and physiology do their work. I have no doubt that
this is a factor, and watching some of the ladies lift is like watching
ballet. It’s beautiful, flawless
movement.
Another argument that is made is that many of the women
coming into the sport have a stronger background in endurance sports. While the men were lifting, the women were
running, so they bring a broader and deeper aerobic base than the men. This is also probably true, but it’s nothing
that six months of training will not rectify, and there are many men who have
been pursuing MS ranks for years and have first-rate energy systems.
I’m going to postulate another theory for why so many women
are ranking so much higher than men in Kettlebell sport in America today: the standards
are lower for women.
Before you take offense, hear me out. This is not about disrespecting the
incredible female athletes who have earned high ranks. They have done something incredibly
difficult, and performed at a much higher level than I have, and I have nothing
but respect for them, However, a
comparison of the standards for men and women, compared to their demonstrated
capabilities, indicates that the goalpost is lower for women than men. Let me show you.
The sport most often compared to Kettlebell sport is middle
distance running, specifically the 5k.
Running a fast 5k, like completing a competition set, requires moderate
to high power output for an extended period of time. The top three men’s times in the 5k average
about 12:30. The top three women’s times
average about 14:00.[1] This means that in terms of the kind of
extended power output required to run a fast 5k or complete a hard Kettlebell set,
women are 94% as fast as men, at
least at the elite levels.
Taking the comparison to the extremes of endurance and
speed, we can look at recent races as well.
Rita Jeptoo completed the 2014 Boston Marathon in 2:18:57, just ten
minutes behind Meb Keflezighi, who finished in 2:08:37. She
was 92% as fast as he was.[2]
At the recent London Olympic games, the average time for the
top three men in the 100m sprint was 9.72 seconds.[3] The average of the top three women was 10.68.[4] Women
ran the race about 91% as fast as men.
There is a performance gap between men and women, but that
gap is narrower than ever before. In
sports that rely on high energy output, pure endurance, and lower body power,
it seems that the best women are performing at over 90% of the best
performances of the men. The sexes are closer than ever in these
kinds of athletic performances.
Do ranking tables reflect this? No.
The largest Kettlebell sport organization in America is the WKC. Let’s look at their ranking table for long
cycle as an example. The 70k weight
class is shared by men and women, and is a good place for comparison. To earn
Master of Sport rank, a man must clean and jerk two 32k Kettlebells 49 times,
lifting a total of 3136k. A woman
earning the same rank must clean and jerk a single 24k Kettlebell 52 times per
arm, for a total of 2496k, or about 80% of the male requirement. Pound for
pound, it seems like the standards for women are well below the gender gap. Women
in comparable sports like middle distance running are putting up performances
at about 94% of what men can do, but are only required to perform at 80% of the
male standards to earn Master of Sport rank.
Another factor comes into play which is much harder to
quantify when one looks at the fact that women use only one Kettlebell. Two factors come to mind. The first is localized fatigue. Women use one hand at a time, and the other
hand, arm, and shoulder get to rest. Using one arm at a time for 5 minutes is quite
a different thing than using both arms together for 10 minutes. In addition to reducing localized fatigue,
working with one arm at a time allows for postural advantages, such as tilting
the pelvis to rest in the rack in a way that opens the chest, making it easier
to breathe, as well as easier to rest the elbow on the iliac crest and reduce
muscular fatigue. Additionally, she can rotate the trunk in the clean, creating a longer pull which uses more musculature to move the bell. Quite simply, it’s
easier to use one bell than two.
Another factor is the difficulty of each rep. Let’s go back to our 70k weight class
example. The 70k man is performing each
rep with a 64k load, over 91% of his
bodyweight. Each clean, each jerk,
is heavy. The 70k woman is lifting only
24k per rep, or just over a third of her
bodyweight. Each rep is disproportionately
lighter for her, even taking differences in gender into account. She is lifting 38% of what he is lifting,
rep-for-rep, at the same bodyweight.
There is a difference, of course, between the absolute
strength of men and women, pound-for-pound.
Let’s look at Olympic weightlifting records for example. The women’s
record in the 69k weight class is a 286k total, lifted by Liu Chunhong of China. In the same weight class, Galabin Boevski of
Bulgaria holds the men's record with a 357k total.
In terms of absolute strength in
the Olympic lifts, the woman’s record is 80% of the man’s in the same weight
class.[5]
Yet rep-for- rep in our 70k Kettlebell sport
example, she is lifting only 38% of what he is lifting. Pound for pound, she may be 80% as strong as
he is, but she lifts about a third of his load per rep. He is working more than twice as hard per rep than she is, even taking differences in genetic potential into account.
I’m aware that my comparison probably breaks down in the heaviest
weight classes. A 200+ pound man may be
very lean and muscular, with much more functional mass than a 200+ pound woman
will likely be, due to physiological structure - men have the potential for
much more muscle than women, and women are designed to carry more bodyfat. The use of anabolic steroids may change this
equation, but I’m not taking this into account.
At the meets where I lift, it does not appear that the women are using
steroids to pack on mass.
Conclusion
I’m not beating a drum against the exceptional women
athletes who are making high ranks in Kettlebell sport today. I commend them,
and appreciate their efforts and accomplishments. My goal here is simply to point out that
among high-level athletes in sports similar to Kettlebell sport, the gender gap
is narrowing. Women are closer than ever
to being as fast as men in speed and endurance sports, and can be four-fifths
as strong as a man. Women have become
exceptionally intimidating athletes, capable of extraordinary feats of strength,
power, and endurance. Kettlebell ranking
standards don’t seem to reflect this advancement.
It seems that perhaps men and women are competing in two
different sports. Lifting a third of one’s
bodyweight with one arm at a time for 104 reps is something quite different,
physiologically, from lifting nine-tenths of one’s bodyweight with both arms 49
times, to use our 70k long cycle competitors for example. She is moving a relatively low load for a lot of reps, and he is moving a relatively heavy load for fewer reps (but still a fairly high number of reps). She can rest one arm and breathe more efficiently, but he uses both arms the whole time, and has to breathe with a heavy load on his chest. These look like different sports to me. They are both extremely difficult sports, and anyone who excels in either one is to be commended. Still, they look quite different.
What to do about it?
That’s not for me to say. I don’t
run an organization, and I don’t write ranking tables. I’m simply offering an explanation for why a disproportionate
number of women are achieving high ranks in the sport, and why men seem to be
slower to make CMS and MS rank. It seems
that most men have to come much closer to their genetic potential to put up MS
numbers than most women. Women are closer to men than ever in terms of athletic capabilities, and the ranking standards do not seem to reflect these great advancement by female athletes.
