March 8, 2025 is International Women’s Day, and March is Women’s History Month. Over the years, we have spoken to a lot of amazing women who have made history at the Olympics and Paralympics. Our podcast has achieved much more than parity; we have definitely reached equality in our coverage! (Don’t know the difference between parity and equality, don’t worry! We have an episode for that.)
Along with speaking with athletes, we have also discussed more complex issues related to women in sports and the history of women in the Olympics and Paralympics. Here are a few episodes that are perfect listening for International Women’s Day:
Gender Equity at the Olympics with Dr. Michele K. Donnelly
Paris 2024 touted being the first Olympics to reach gender parity, meaning the same number of male and female athletes competing. True. But how does parity relate to equity and equality? Is it all the same? Not true!
Dr. Donnelly explains the difference and how the history of the Olympics parallels the history of women’s sports. Michele K. Donnelly is Assistant Professor in the Department of Sport Management at Brock University in Canada and author of Gender Equality and the Olympic Programme. She goes into detail about how we can evaluate how far women in sports have come, and how far we still need to go.
Swimming Pretty with Author Vicki Valosik
Until Paris 2024, artistic swimming was one of only two sports in the Summer Olympics available only to women (the other is rhythmic gymnastics). Despite a rule change for Paris 2024 allowing men to compete in the team event, no team included a man.
The history of artistic swimming is wrapped up in the history of women and women’s sports, particularly in the United States. Vicki Valosik, author of Swimming Pretty: the Untold Story of Women in the Water, chatted with us about sexism in swimming, the changing definition of femininity, and the overlooked athleticism of these amazing ballerinas of the water.
Long Run to Glory with Author Stephen Lane
Women did not run a marathon in the Olympics until 1984. 1984! Stephen Lane, author of Long Road to Glory, discusses the hurdles women in long-distance running had to jump to be recognized as both serious athletes and real women. He recounts the epic women’s race in Los Angeles that featured some of the greatest runners, men or women, to ever run an Olympic marathon.
Historian Georgia Cervin on the Evolution of Women’s Gymnastics
Women’s gymnastics is the crown jewel of any Summer Olympics. Fans flock to watch these tiny women achieve feats of daring beauty. Unfortunately, it has also been the center of abuse of girls and young women in sports. Sports scholar and former international gymnast Georgia Cervin joins us to talk about her book, Degrees of Difficulty: How Women’s Gymnastics Rose to Prominence and Fell From Grace. We talk about how the push and pull of femininity and athleticism has changed the sport over the decades, and where women’s gymnastics stands today.
Women’s Sled Hockey with Monica Quimby
Like wheelchair rugby in the Summer Paralympics, sled hockey (officially called para ice hockey) allows both women and men to participate on the same team. In practice, only three women have ever competed at the Winter Paralympics in sled hockey. Monica Quimby is one of many players pushing to develop a women’s game. Quimby has played sled hockey since 2012 and has won three straight gold medals with Team USA at the Women’s Para Ice Hockey World Challenge. Will we see the sport at the 2030 Winter Paralympics?
Author Alexandra Allred on Women in Sports Throughout History
Alexandra Allred not only writes about the history of women in sports, she lived it. Allred competed on the first US women’s bobsled team–while she was pregnant. We talk about the myths related to women’s health that have been wielded as weapons to bar women from participating (ever hear of a falling uterus?) and the amazing women who overcome barriers and discrimination just to be in the game. Allred is the author of When Women Stood: The Untold History of Females Who Changed Sports and the World.
Annika Malacinski on Women’s Nordic Combined
Unlike Paris 2024, you won’t hear as much about gender parity at next year’s Olympics in Milan-Cortina. That’s because it will be impossible to achieve. Nordic combined is the one sport on the program for the Milano-Cortina 2026 Olympics that only includes a competition for men.
Team USA’s Annika Malacinski has been working to change that. Why is it so hard to develop a women’s circuit? We spoke to Annika before the 2022 Beijing Olympics while women were still trying to get their sport on the 2026 program. Now, even men’s Nordic combined is on the chopping block for the 2030 Olympics, mainly because of the lack of development in the women’s field.
Chamonix 1924: Figure Skating
At the first Winter Olympics in Chamonix, France in 1924, women competed in only one sport: figure skating. Out of the 250 athletes at Chamonix, 13 were women. But those 13 women managed to make quite an impression. Legend Sonja Henie made her debut on Olympic ice at only 11 years old. Gold medalist Herma Planck-Szabo scandalized some with her short skirt. The ladies of the ice filled newspapers and news reels around the world with beauty and athleticism. Take a look back at the first women of the first Winter Olympics.
Book Club Claire on Inaugural Ballers
Plenty of our book club selections are by women Olympians and Paralympians (including Sydney Collier, Oksana Masters, Dominique Moceanu, and Shirley Babashoff), but the best book club choice to cover women’s sports is Inaugural Ballers: The True Story of the First US Women’s Olympic Basketball Team by Andrew Maraniss, one of our favorite authors. Women did not compete in Olympic basketball until 1976. The women of the 1976 American team fought discrimination, lack of funding and opportunities, and ignorance of women’s sport to reach glory on the international stage. We talk about the effects of Title IX and the troubles still faced by women’s basketball teams today.
Movie Club: The Fire Inside
The 2024 biopic The Fire Inside tells the story of Olympic boxer Claressa Shields and her journey to winning her first Olympic gold medal at London 2012. The movie also goes beyond her first victory to show the struggle Claressa faced because did not fit the mold for a female athlete expected from the public. Other movie club episodes talk about the ladies of the Olympics: Over the Limit about Russian rhythmic gymnast Margarita Mamun; A Promise Kept: The Oksana Baiul Story; and I, Tonya, about notorious figure skater Tonya Harding.
We were fortunate to celebrate International Women’s Day during our time in Beijing (three years later, our gifts are as potent as ever!). International Women’s Day is the day to honor the amazing women in your life. Be sure to bring your favorite woman a rose!
–Alison Brown