To be more accurate, there are increasing numbers of women that are
purchasing membership but attendance at some specific event by women has
been decreasing. Of the OBRA annual members slightly more than 15% are
women, which is actually up somewhat from previous years. There are almost
400 female annual members. I remember just a few years ago we were able to
cover both juniors and women with the 200 series of annual numbers because
there were less than 100 women and juniors combined.
To look specifically at attendance:
In 2006, before cyclocross, there were 86 days of racing that had women
specific races. These days yielded 2252 women rider day. There were an
average of 14.4 riders in these races.
The numbers so far for 2007 are; total days 62, rider days 1478,
average/race 11.5. I suspect by the end of the season the numbers will be
roughly similar.
Historically a higher percentage of women members have attended races
compared to men. In general about 10% of the available market will turn out
to any given race. For women's race this has, in the past, been closer to
20% for many races. As total numbers of women members go up I expect that
the percentage that attend a specific race will move more towards the rate
seen with men.
Some of the problems with getting inadequate field sizes is constructing the
fields without consideration of the potential number of riders that will be
in that field. The membership numbers and age distributions for women are:
Road
Cat. # <30 30-34 35-39 40-44 45-50 50+
1 7 1 1 3 1 1 0
2 21 5 5 6 3 2 0
3 57 12 14 12 8 7 4
4 249 78 40 43 32 30 26
no road 25
Mtn Bike
Pro/Expert 10 5 11 11 3 2 1
Sport 50 13 9 12 9 5 4
Beginner 101 43 11 21 14 8 4
no mtn 189
mean age 34.8
minimum 8
maximum 63
You can see that if you put on a Cat 1/2 women's race and EVERYBODY shows up
there will only be 28 riders in the field. Since there will never be 100%
attendance so the expected attendance for a 1/2 women's race would be 3-6
riders. Conversely it is easy to see that if you want to have high
attendance you limit participation in the race to just Cat 4 women; this is
the largest group by far and including the faster categories merely
decreases participation by the slower ones.
I will be interested in seeing the results of survey below. I expect that
we will be able to look at it and use the information to create a better
product.
Mike Murray
-----Original Message-----
From: obra-bounces@list.obra.org [mailto:obra-bounces@list.obra.org] On
Behalf Of uma kleppinger
Sent: Thursday, July 19, 2007 21:46 PM
To: obra@list.obra.org
Subject: [OBRA Chat] Oregon Women's Bicycle Racing Survey
Hello OBRAland:
As you are all very aware, the number of women racing in Oregon has been
dwindling. For a state possessing the largest number of registered racers
per capita, why is such a low percentage of our racers women?
In conjunction with several preeminent women racers and women's race
supporters, we've created a survey to try to gather more specific
information about why women race or not, and what factors contribute to
which races women participate in.
I know that many women who race do not read OBRA chat/emails, so team
leaders, I am asking for your help... Please forward the survey link to your
women riders. And everyone, please feel free to forward the survey link to
women you know who may be interested in racing, whether or not they
currently are an OBRA member/racing.
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=5EuLTsyhyMiwp9I92MLgRA_3d_3d
Thanks for your help in creating a more vibrant women's racing community.
Uma Kleppinger
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