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Cindy's Journal

We hope you find inspiration in Cindy's daily endeavors, and perhaps decide to try something new and challenging yourself!

July 15 -- Watched a great bike race in town this weekend; it reminded me how much I love to cycle outside, so I made a commitment to get outside this week and go for an afternoon ride. A side bonus to the exercise was a chance meeting with another cyclist. (I sometimes use other cyclists on the road as targets for me to catch up to or pass, and I happened to catch up with a very nice - and nice looking - rider.) We chatted and made tentative plans to ride together sometime soon. Yeah, exercise pays off!!

July 29 -- Tried sea kayaking for the first time this past weekend. It was definitely tough, but soooo worth it! I went for a guided tour with some friends along the north shore coast, and was treated to pungent sea air, great vistas, and a real sense of accomplishment - we logged three miles on the water! I think I’ve found a new hobby!!

August 5 -- Road trips and house projects kept me from getting to exercise this week. Finally got to a short yoga class after a 2 1/2 weeks hiatus. I could feel my muscles working, reaching, stretching, and enjoying the movements. Now, if I can just keep at it...

August 12 -- I finally got to two yoga classes this week, and boy were they tough. Looking around the room, I saw people of all shapes, sizes and ages, too. One woman looked to be between 65 and 70, and as I watched her out of the corner of my eye during a bending stretch, I thought: I want to be as motivated and as nimble as she is when I’m 65!

It helped me reaffirm commitment to myself and my body - a day by day commitment that I find difficult in my very busy schedule. But, if I go a few days without good physical activity, I’ll try not to beat myself up.

As Scarlett O’Hara once said, back of her hand held to her forehead: “Tomorrow IS another day!”

Amazon Women

She will be interviewing local women about their favorite physical activities and inspirational role models.

Nancy takes the hotseat herself this month as the first featured “Amazon.”

Name: Lisa Braithwaite
Age: 36
Occupation: Director of Programs for the Morgan Foundation, better known to Body Electric members as its Executive Director
Favorite sport(s): Basketball
Role model: Babe Didrikson Zaharias

Women’s basketball is a team sport that fosters a sense of community and offers the opportunity to learn various skills. Even though players are part of a unified team, basketball offers the freedom to make independent decisions that can demonstrate individual talent and still positively effect the team. These are just some of the reasons why Lisa’s favorite sport is basketball – throw in the fast pace, flashy action, and high scoring potential and it’s hard for her not to get excited, whether she’s playing, watching, or talking about it.

Participating in a women’s fan- tasy basketball camp a few years ago reinforced that women of any age or physical ability can enjoy basketball; all they really need is a ball and a hoop. Basketball brings women together as a cooperative team and showcases women’s athleticism.

Profile: Babe Didrikson Zaharias

For those of us not very well versed in women’s sports history, Babe Didrikson Zaharias is a name we slightly recognize, but aren’t quite sure why. So it was pretty exciting to hear Lisa number off Didrikson’s many victories, medals, and achievements in basketball, softball, track and field, and golf.

Didrikson’s athletic career began as a basketball and softball star, which brought on the spotlight and criticism as well. The confident attitude she radiated, although well deserved, was more typical of male athletes – this self-confidence led the public to portray her as boastful and unladylike.

Amidst the pressure to look and act more like a lady, Didrikson continued to excel in sports and went even further, taking two gold medals and a silver medal in track and field in the 1932 Olympics. Between 1930 and 1932, Didrikson held American, Olympic, or world records in five different track and field events.

After taking up golf in 1933, she went on to rack up 35 career golf victories – including seventeen straight tournament victories during the 1946-1947 seasons. She was also a co-founder of the LPGA. In 1950 she was given the honor of being named the “Greatest Female Athlete” of the first half of the 20th century.

A testament to her strength and determination was her victory at the US Open in 1954 – only one year after cancer diagnosis and surgery. The cancer caught up with her at the age of 45, when she passed away, leaving behind the legacy of a true pioneer.

Team Artemis Takes Off!

Adventure Club’s Team Artemis is a new event-based training team for women of all ages and sports abilities. Its mission is to provide education, support, motivation and inspiration toward achieving success in a wide variety of endurance activities such as triathlons, marathons, mountain climbing, bike races and more.

Team Artemis provides a safe and supportive environment in which to explore sports that require greater amounts of conditioning and ongoing training. Due to the more strenuous nature of this program, there will be minimum physical prerequisites for most activities.

Team Artemis will offer seasonal activities depending on interest and turnout. If you have a favorite sport or activity you have always wanted to try, feel free to contact us. Costs will be minimal to participate in these great activities.

Contact sharon@bodyelectric-sb.org for more information

Cheerleading: Equal Opportunity for Girls?

Girls on the sidelines. Girls as time-out and half-time entertainment. Girls playing secondary roles to boys. Is cheerleading more than that? Has cheerleading outgrown the stereotype of perky girls playing supporting roles to male athletes? Is cheerleading a sport?

School spirit and support of athletes is fabulous! But do cheerleading programs support athletes, or do cheerleading programs support male athletes? I’d like to think that there are some cheerleading programs out there that support all sports and enthusiastically attend and support girls’ sporting events. But this has not been my experience.

Last year I went to a local CIF girls’ basketball game, and there were no cheerleaders from our local school to support the team. At a CIF game! And the story was the same when I was in high school. The whole cheerleading squad attended the boys’ games and enthusiastically supported the boys’ sports programs. But when I looked up from the court during our girls’ basketball games, I could never spot more than two girls in cheerleading uniforms sitting somewhere quietly in the bleachers. There were no time-out cheers or half-time routines at the girls’ events.

2-4-6-8 See how we discriminate!

Are the cheerleaders really just there to support the boys’ teams? If not, how can we explain why all-girl schools don’t have cheerleading squads? They’ve got spirit, yes they do! But their spirit is evidenced on the playing field as opposed to on the sidelines. Could it be that when girls have adequate opportunity and encouragement to participate in sports, cheerleading is no longer an attractive option? Or is it simply that cheerleading is primarily intended to support boys?
I have seen some positive changes in cheerleading, including the presence and enthusiastic performance of the Gaucho cheerleaders at the women’s basketball games. (Does their support match their support of men’s games? I honestly don’t know – I’ve never been to a men’s game.) But even these improvements are a little too little, a little too late.

So, what about cheerleading as a sport? There is no doubt that many cheerleaders are athletes with incredible strength and flexibility, dedicated to developing their skills and challenging their bodies. They have intense training, practice and performance schedules. But cheerleaders are performers, kept on the sidelines as entertainment and support for the main sporting attraction.

There are some squads that attend cheerleading competitions, but for most of them the competition is secondary to the main purpose – providing support and entertainment at sporting events. Some squads only compete and do not cheer at events. Now this sounds more like sports to me! But this is the exception, and not the rule.

While I admire the dedication, strength and agility of cheerleaders, I will not support a program that idolizes boys, sidelines girls, and generally ignores female athletes and sporting events. I passionately disagree with the suggestion that cheerleading is an appropriate alternative to sports for girls. Cheerleading keeps girls on the sidelines, as opposed to on the field or the court.

Most importantly, I will not support cheerleading at the expense of promoting and encouraging girls in sports. But that is just what some schools are suggesting we do.

Title IX of the 1972 Education Amendments mandates that schools provide equal opportunities for girls and boys, including through their athletic programs. One way for a school to comply with Title IX is to show that their ratio of female and male athletes is roughly proportional to the school’s entire student body. Sadly, almost all schools have a disproportionately low number of female athletes and fail this proportionality test.

Schools have to comply with Title IX, if at all, by other means, such as showing a history and continuing practice of program expansion for the girls. This is what Title IX is all about – requiring educational institutions to develop programs for and encourage participation of the underrepresented sex.

But schools could avoid promoting girls in sports, and thereby defeat the purpose of Title IX, if they are allowed to count cheerleaders as female athletes in order to meet the proportionality test.

It comes as no surprise then, that schools that are out of compliance with Title IX and don’t want to fix the problem are arguing that cheerleading should be considered a sport. By keeping girls on the sidelines, they can argue that they’ve sufficiently promoted girls in sports.

Sidelining girls to support sports instead of participate in them – all in the name of gender equity and equal opportunity.

Sis! Boom! Bah! Humbug!

By Jana Johnston,
Body Electric Board Member