Women v Men - Case Closed?

TheOne

TheOne

www.MetroPool.club
Silver Member
I started a thread on here a few years ago asking why women couldn't compete with men since it wasn't a physical sport. It got lots of respsonses and this type of thread has popped up a few times since but for the most part both sides of the arguments had little stats to back up their arguments.

I brought this topic up with a female pro and she argued that men had a huge advantage over women because the break is such a big factor. I didn't buy this excuse because the likes of pagulyan etc are tiny but they still manage to have great breaks and dominate. She argued that mens muscles are more explosive but I still think the break is more about "timing" than muscle density!

IMO one of the best things about the IPT was for the first time we got to see the best women in the world playing the best men for big stakes.

Given Allisons and Karen's impressive results is the case now closed, and does this mean all the other women below the top few women have no excuse and should be raising their game?
 
Sorry Craig,
Not that I disagree with you at all, I think that men can and will beat the women when the time comes. But I don't think that you can make that statement based solely on one tournament. If that were the case, now we would all have to agree that Earl cannot compete with the rest of the players. I think we should wait for the end of 2006 before we make the claim that "Men are better than women".
 
If the break is the downfall then women should excell at 14.1 (straight pool), one pocket and golf.

If physical size is the reason how do you explain Alex's break? On the other hand why are some of the players using a softer break?
 
Here we go again ...
No, 2 particular women doing well does not mean all other women are dogging it and can raise there level. It may be so, but I'm of the opinion it is not.

I don't think that pure strength is the reason men have a better break, though that is a factor. I think it all goes back to our hunter/gatherer past. The hunters (men) have better hand/eye coordination (and strength) at gross movements such as throwing a spear or stroking a cue. The gatherers (women) had to have better hand/eye coordination (and manual dexterity) at fine movements such as picking berries of a bush efficiently. JMHO, but I think that like all athletic endeavors it is more about coordination than pure strength or sociological factors.
 
davidhop said:
Sorry Craig,
Not that I disagree with you at all, I think that men can and will beat the women when the time comes. But I don't think that you can make that statement based solely on one tournament. If that were the case, now we would all have to agree that Earl cannot compete with the rest of the players. I think we should wait for the end of 2006 before we make the claim that "Men are better than women".
Click to expand...

No problem David,
What suprised me was that even though it was just one event it wasn't just one result. Karen in particular and a string of great results against some of the best men in the world! This was no small time tour event with a handful of top pro's, this was an invite only elite field. Yes we will of course have a better picture at the end of the year and maybe we should reserve judgement. But I think what the ladies did at the IPT event was very impressive indeed.

TheBook,
Excellent points indeed and I totally agree. Why is it then that only a handful of women seem to be able to compete with the men? Are the other girls not putting in the hours, is it their snooker background (god forbid!), or is it purely a numbers game (eg more men play so greater number of better male players)?

I still don't see any physical reason why the women can't compete with the men?
 
I was very pleased to see the IPT format where the Women and Men competed against each other. I think it is great for the game. years ago Jean
Baulukus wanted to compete on the mens tours. My 2 cents is keep the WPBA
and Women that want to compete in the IPT can do so if they qualify just like the men.:)
 
Personally ....

I think if the 'innings' were recorded throughout a WPBA
event, it would become very apparent where the line
could be drawn for pro women players that would be
capable of competing against men pros.

Although the Hunter/Gatherer theory is interesting, I do
not believe it relevant for this arguement. I believe most
can be attributed to differences of the way we are built
and muscle structure, and the fact that boys are exposed
to competitive sports at a younger age and more often than
girls are, therefore their coordination, timing, and strength
is better developed to take on any sport. As girls become
more competitive through their own sports programs now,
we will end up finding more competitive women in Pool.
(In case you haven't noticed, the term "He plays like a girl"
usually is about a guy trying to play Pool that never competed
in sports when he was in school).

Although women can master the basics pretty well, I often find
them lacking in the 'special' type shots in Pool; jumps, masses',
muscle shots with english, power draws, power shots with the
cue ball on the end rail, things of this nature. Plus, I have noticed
that they all seem to have a pause before the hit stroke, much more
so than men players. And for some reason, it takes them longer to
master a correct type of bridge with their hand which holds up their
progress in the game.
 
One step further

catscradle said:
Here we go again ...
No, 2 particular women doing well does not mean all other women are dogging it and can raise there level. It may be so, but I'm of the opinion it is not.

I don't think that pure strength is the reason men have a better break, though that is a factor. I think it all goes back to our hunter/gatherer past. The hunters (men) have better hand/eye coordination (and strength) at gross movements such as throwing a spear or stroking a cue. The gatherers (women) had to have better hand/eye coordination (and manual dexterity) at fine movements such as picking berries of a bush efficiently. JMHO, but I think that like all athletic endeavors it is more about coordination than pure strength or sociological factors.
Click to expand...

I think you could take this further and say that most women play differently than men when younger and therefore do less activities that are directly related to eye hand coordination. When boys ages 2-10 play, there are proportionately more boys doing eye/hand things than girls. Nowadays that is changing allot with many more women into sports, the gap and time will close this difference. Now what I don't see, even in the very top women player, is a SECOND GEAR and then hours of smoothed out incredible play for hours at at time.
 
I think the reason the women, especially Allison and Karen did so well is that they have been getting a lot of experience the past few years in televised events and more importantly, that there has been enough money in the women's game to allow them to work on their games full times and to inspire them to higher levels.

If women's pool had a 10 million a year tour while the men's tour languished, I'd expect women would become the dominant players.

Some women can and will break well enough if they have to learn how.

I think the men will clearly dominate at the top level, but I wouldn't be totally suprised if some women do well. The main reasons I figure are these:
1. More male participants in the game.
2. Men are naturally more competitive, in that they will do anything to avoid losing...even if that means practing loooong hours. I believe less women have this desire to prove themselves in something so seemingly trivial as pool.
3. More men will acquire the strength requirements which create an advantage.
4. The is some evidence to suggest that men, on average, have higher spacial awareness attributes....maybe because they are more likely to jump around and throw things and play games as kids.
 
Well, I think this experiment is very telling: next time you go into a pool room in the middle of the day, take a look around. Count the number of men and women you see shooting.

I think shooting pool in the middle of the day when the crowds aren't there, nobody's drinking very much, and the music is either quiet or entirely off, means you're serious about the game of pool. And if you counted even a single woman in the pool hall practicing in the daytime, your pool room is already more balanced than mine.

I think what it all comes down to is that it's men that are spending their time practicing the game, and so it's men that are better at the game. Now obviously any female pro does spend a whole hell of a lot of time practicing the game, and lack of practice is not a problem for them. But if there are 2.7 million men and 27 women who are devoted to the game, the top 5 out of 2.7 million are going to be better than the top 5 out of 27 (I know those numbers are grossly inaccurate, just trying to make my point clear).

-Andrew
 
Colin Colenso said:
I think the reason the women, especially Allison and Karen did so well is that they have been getting a lot of experience the past few years in televised events and more importantly, that there has been enough money in the women's game to allow them to work on their games full times and to inspire them to higher levels.

If women's pool had a 10 million a year tour while the men's tour languished, I'd expect women would become the dominant players.

Some women can and will break well enough if they have to learn how.

I think the men will clearly dominate at the top level, but I wouldn't be totally suprised if some women do well. The main reasons I figure are these:
1. More male participants in the game.
2. Men are naturally more competitive, in that they will do anything to avoid losing...even if that means practing loooong hours. I believe less women have this desire to prove themselves in something so seemingly trivial as pool.
3. More men will acquire the strength requirements which create an advantage.
4. The is some evidence to suggest that men, on average, have higher spacial awareness attributes....maybe because they are more likely to jump around and throw things and play games as kids.
Click to expand...

Very well stated, in our little leagues around here i know the girl teams some of them play way better then some guys here, Man i wished i could have been there to see Allison and Karen play in the KOTH.
 
Colin Colenso said:
3. More men will acquire the strength requirements which create an advantage.
Click to expand...

In Bob Henning's "The Advanced Pro Book" he talks about the advantages of taking a full stroke whenever possible. The main advantage, at least from what I can tell, is that it strengthens one's confidence. And by golly, it's just cool to power the balls into the pockets. That's a guy thing, far as I know. It also happens that some shots *require* a very full stroke to be able to move the cue ball where it needs to go. At that moment, either one has a power stroke or one has to go with something inferior. How many women have you witnessed really powering the ball? I'm sure they're around, but I haven't seen too many of them. I'm not referring to an occasional power stroke coming from top women pros, but the gals we see shooting at pool halls and in tournaments. That aspect of the game seems to be lost on most of them, or am I mistaken?

Flex
 
Flex said:
In Bob Henning's "The Advanced Pro Book" he talks about the advantages of taking a full stroke whenever possible. The main advantage, at least from what I can tell, is that it strengthens one's confidence. And by golly, it's just cool to power the balls into the pockets. That's a guy thing, far as I know. It also happens that some shots *require* a very full stroke to be able to move the cue ball where it needs to go. At that moment, either one has a power stroke or one has to go with something inferior. How many women have you witnessed really powering the ball? I'm sure they're around, but I haven't seen too many of them. I'm not referring to an occasional power stroke coming from top women pros, but the gals we see shooting at pool halls and in tournaments. That aspect of the game seems to be lost on most of them, or am I mistaken?

Flex
Click to expand...
You're not mistaken.

The best women are the ones who can execute the power strokes, as well as the finess strokes. They will also be the ones who have more competitive drive, more testosterone, and have smaller breasts or a stance that breasts don't factor in.

There isn't just one main reason, or one overpowering reason. There are several. There are at least 5 or 6 good reasons as to why women haven't achieved the same level as men. Each has probably been addressed already. Some are social; some are physical. (I know many will be compelled to say 'I see no phyical reason, etc., but there is) As a combination, it puts the average woman at a disadvantage. That doesn't mean a woman can't reach, say, top 10 status. It just means that they already have a disadvantage on the whole, and that it will be simply tougher for the average woman to achieve the same level as the average man.

Fred
 
My fiancé and I were discussing this. She read in a science book, (Mind Hacks) by Tom Stafford and Matt Webb, that men have a bigger brain (physically). We also learned the different parts of the brain in both sexes are larger. It's been a while, so this is by my shorter memory, but men have a larger section of the brain that deals with concepts and spacial thinking. Women have a larger section on relations and memory. How all this applies to pool is not something I know, but I do have a theory and it has a lot of holes.

In "generalizations" we know that when giving directions between the sexes, that men use route names and numbers and that women use landmarks. Obviously, it is the combination of these two things that gives the best directions, but it is not the norm.

When playing pool I am thinking the men see the routes and invisible roads and path of the cue ball "spatially' better. They don't need the landmarks to see these things. On the other side of this, women can see and reproduce what they have learned much easier and more quickly due to their memory advantage and the fact that they see the relationship of "if I do this, this happens." Even though I believe women can learn to play faster than men, I think it takes much more practice for them to use all the patterns and routes. There are few landmarks on the table that are permanent. Meaning balls are not in the same place even though the spots and diamonds and pockets are always there. I do think the more women play the more they improve in the routes and advanced side of the strategies of the game. I also think the men see the routes without effort, even if they haven't seen that particular route before. When I am saying this I am referring to looking at all the safeties that could come up and positions that need to be seen in playing many balls ahead in their minds.

This is obviously a theory and it is also just a generalization. It would be interesting to see how an instructor teaching both sexes, would explain the progress over time, especially if he taught the women in relational/landmark terms rather than degrees of angles and so forth. I don't think many instructors do this and I don't know of any videos teaching pool in this way.

I am excited about the sexes playing together regularly. In the past this is not the case. They have played each other but not regularly. Time will take the un-comfortableness and the feeling like someone has to "prove something to the world" out of the equation. The guy palying the girl emotions will hopefully disapate some, everyone can just play.

The interesting part in the beginning will be watching some egos being dealt with and seeing how everyone handles the pressure and so forth. Even thoughh we are all human beings and individuals, we all handle stuff differently.
 
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TheOne said:
Given Allisons and Karen's impressive results is the case now closed, and does this mean all the other women below the top few women have no excuse and should be raising their game?
Click to expand...

I don't think Allison Fisher did too well in Orlando. She was knocked out after the first day of round robin play. The only woman to survive more than a day was Ms. Corr. Additionally, the HOF women fared the same as Allison once they were seeded. None of them survived after the first day of their play.
 
Here is an article that we found quite insteresting:

The Difference Between the Male and Female Brain
Mark Kastleman

Significant differences exist between the male and female brains. Although what follows has been meticulously gathered from the research and writings of leading scientists and psychologists, it is by no means a hard and fast rule or description of every man and every woman. Every person is different and unique.

However, the facts clearly bear out that for nearly all men and women there are significant differences between the male and female brain. This means that in most cases, men and women do not behave, feel, think, or respond in the same ways, either on the inside or on the outside.

  • The male brain is highly specialized, using specific parts of one hemisphere or the other to accomplish specific tasks. The female brain is more diffused and utilizes significant portions of both hemispheres for a variety of tasks.

  • Men are able to focus on narrow issues and block out unrelated information and distractions. Women naturally see everyday things from a broader, “big-picture” vantage point.

  • Men can narrowly focus their brains on specific tasks or activities for long periods of time without tiring. Women are better equipped to divide their attention among multiple activities or tasks.

  • Men are able to separate information, stimulus, emotions, relationships, etc. into separate compartments in their brains, while women tend to link everything together.

  • Men see individual issues with parts of their brain, while women look at the holistic or multiple issues with their whole brain (both hemispheres).

  • Men have as much as 20 times more testosterone in their systems than do women. This makes men typically more aggressive, dominant and more narrowly focused on the physical aspects of sex.

  • In men, the dominant perceptual sense is vision, which is typically not the case with women. All of a woman’s senses are, in some respects, more finely tuned than those of a man.

The rest of this article had to do with pornography, which has nothing to do with pool, but since you are going to ask anyway, here is the address:
http://www.contentwatch.com/learn_center/article.php?id=165

Another article on size and thinking differences is here:
http://www.cerebromente.org.br/n11/mente/eisntein/cerebro-homens.html
 
Interesting stuff, Donovan. Very convincing case that differences in spatial thinking and vision, along with narrow focus and plain competitive doggedness will make it an uphill battle for women vs. men in pool. Hard to be sure about the strength factor ... lot of little guys are killers out there. Of course, Alex or Santos could probably open a jar better than most gals, lol. Do they just not eat when we're not around to do that for them?
 
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