Help! Discrimination against female cyclists

[lunacycles]

Quote:
I do not see it as Discrimination and I disagree with you that I should.

My words were in direct response to the last sentence of your paragraph where you said about bike companies providing bikes for people of your size:

"I hardly expect every company to do so."

I responded: you should.

It wasn't meant as a judgment, sorry if it came across that way. Where or when you see discrimination isn't for me to judge--I was not talking about what you should see as discrimination. I was talking about business decisions made on the parts of bike companies that affect you the consumer that, in the end, affect the chain of supply and what your options are as a consumer.

Yeah, I am happy to order anything for a customer without ever stocking it. That is simply instant profit. I risk nothing. But investing in it by putting it in my inventory and, in a shop's case, on the floor where you can test ride it and talk with me about it before you are obligated to buy it means (in my mind) that you matter as much as my other customers for whom I provide many options.

I am oversimplifying, but I do believe that speaking up about what we want and need as consumers makes a difference.

[tribogota]

drifting further.
Just for the record, Triathlon gives equal pay in the prize money categories and the professional level races are for both, equal conditions, and equal race courses, plus they are now developing paralimpic triathlon for the london olympics.
YEAH Triathlon.
I guess being a newer sport helps generate more equality from the beginning, whereas cycling, they have to fight many more decades of discrimination.

[Crankin]

I agree with you Margo. I had to go through hell to get 165 cranks for my Kuota. This after the LBS owner told me that the 170s would "make me into a climbing queen." Yea, right, if you pay for the personal trainer to do that.
While I agree that some unisex bikes will fit me at barely 5'1" (I have one), it takes a lot of work to make that happen. I would have preferred not to have had to research short and shallow bars and short reach brifters on my own, after spending what I did. I had 2 WSD bikes before this one; one was just cheap/entry level with crappy components, but the other one was OK. What I want is CHOICE. The same choice that a 5 foot 9 inch male would have.

[Kiwi Stoker]

In regards to bike sponsorship in NZ and Australia provided by bike distributers, the package offered to both male and female sponsored riders (this includes triathletes, BMX etc) is exactly the same. Same amount of product, dollars and support (replacement parts etc is bike damaged).

[kenyonchris]

This is an easy fix. I buy men's stuff. At 5'4, 110 lbs, I buy men's extra small. I HATE the flowery, pink women's stuff. It looks a little big on me, but whatever. Should I have to do that? Well, it is whatever the market will bear. I don't think that society is as gender or race driven as money driven. If the majority of buyers had prehensile tails, then all our shorts would have tail holes in them.