Beijing
\nThe Beijing Olympics are the most gender-balanced Winter Games ever, with competitors saying the expansion of mixed team events \u201cmeans a lot\u201d and helps drive up standards in women\u2019s sport.
\nMore than half of all events at the Beijing Games feature women, thanks to the addition of two more women\u2019s events and four new mixed-team ones\u2014in ski jumping, aerials, snowboard cross, and short track speed skating.
\nMarion Thenault, who competed for Canada in the freestyle skiing mixed aerials event on Thursday, told AFP that it was \u201creally great\u201d to have athletes of different genders competing against each other.
\n\u201cIt means that your team has to be strong on the men\u2019s side and the women\u2019s side, and it just pushes the sport for both genders,\u201d she said after helping her team win the inaugural bronze medal.
\n\u201cI think that\u2019s really good because it\u2019s a male-dominated sport, but here tonight we showed we have strong teams with great females in them.\u201d
\nCompetitor Ashley Caldwell, part of the winning US team, said there was \u201calways room to develop\u201d when it comes to representation in sport but hoped the event could \u201cshowcase\u201d female athletes.
\n\u201cI\u2019ve always pushed myself to do harder tricks to show the world that women can do it,\u201d she said.
\n\u201cTo have more women in sport at a high level is great for the world\u2014empowering people around the world to respect women and to be in sport.\u201d
\nRecord number of women
\nThe two new women\u2019s events which have been added to the Beijing Olympics programme are monobob in bobsleigh and Big Air, which was won by California-born Chinese freestyle skiing star Eileen Gu.
\nWomen account for a record 45 percent of athletes at the Beijing Games, up from 41 percent in Pyeongchang four years ago.Three countries –
\nEcuador, Kosovo, and Malaysia\u2014have a female athlete at the Winter Olympics for the first time.
\nInternational Olympic Committee sports director Kit McConnell said greater female representation \u201cis not just a statistic\u201d.
\n\u201cWe have record levels of female participation, record numbers of female athletes, and record numbers of both female and mixed events at these games,\u201d he said.
\n\u201cEvery female athlete that\u2019s here has a ripple effect\u201d in terms of investment, he added.
\nFor the first time at a Winter Games, there is also an openly non-binary Olympian \u2014 pairs figure skater Timothy LeDuc.
\nAshley (Cain-Gribble, their skating partner) and I represent an alternative in pairs skating, a different narrative, \u201cLeDuc,\u201d who uses the pronouns they\/their but whose gender is classed as male on their athlete page, said.
\n\u2018Women\u2019s level being pushed\u2019
\nThe mixed team events do not always feature an equal number of men and women.
\nThe mixed team aerials event, in which the United States edged out China to win gold after a hard-fought contest at Genting Snow Park, featured six teams of three.
\nThe rules stipulated that each team must have at least one male and one female athlete competing \u2014 but in practice, all six competing teams selected two male and one female.
\nSwitzerland\u2019s Alexandra Baer said it was \u201cunderstandable because people want to push for the podium\u201d.
\n\u201cThat\u2019s just a bit easier if you have two men doing three flips and five twists instead of another girl,\u201d she said.
\n\u201cWe\u2019re at the moment where the women\u2019s level is being pushed, and if that keeps going, I think we can also have teams with two women and one guy. I think that\u2019s possible.\u201d
\nCaldwell also believes things are moving in the right direction.
\n\u201cThe US is incredible because we have so much access to women\u2019s sports, and that\u2019s been a benefit to me,\u201d she said.
\n\u201cTo increase that around the world is incredible, and I hope this showcases that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Beijing The Beijing Olympics are the most gender-balanced Winter Games ever, with competitors saying the expansion of mixed team events \u201cmeans a lot\u201d and helps drive up standards in women\u2019s sport. More than half of all events at the Beijing Games feature women, thanks to the addition of two more women\u2019s events and four new […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":244233,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[882,4033,1396],"class_list":{"0":"post-244214","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-beijing-olympics","9":"tag-gender-balanced","10":"tag-winter-games"},"yoast_head":"\n