Are men naturally more fit than women?

May 6, 2008 1:14 AM

My girlfriend says that women are naturally less fit than men. Is this true?

I work from home and sit in a chair for about 12 hours a day, I'm definitely not aerobically fit but I also have very little fat and I'm not a complete wimp. My exercise consists of about 5 hours of walking a week... maybe some biking.

My girlfriend works in a lab and says that she's often very active for hours at a time. But generally, she's about as active as I am. Yet, I'm still more fit than her, what's up?

posted by mallow005 to health (43 comments total)

Guys build muscle significantly faster, and naturally have a lower body fat % for a variety of reasons. In terms of strength, it takes a lot less for guys to build/maintain than for women. In terms of endurance, there's a threshold at which women start having an advantage - I remember a graph in Noakes' Lore of Running that put it between 50 & 70 miles. Not a very complete answer, but that's the basics.
posted by devilsbrigade at 1:47 AM on May 6

Testosterone encourages/is involved in muscle production. Guys have more testosterone.

Anecdotally, my brother is 10 months younger than me. When he hit puberty, with no change in our relative levels of exercise, it changed from me whipping his ass in races (anything from 100m to around the block, from memory) to me not bothering to compete.
posted by jacalata at 1:54 AM on May 6

I agree with Dee. It really depends on how you're choosing to define your fitness. Muscle mass is not a direct measure of fitness - there are plenty of large muscular people on the verge of heart failure. Body fat is also not a clear indicator. A lot of people measure fitness in terms of physical endurance, but in this case there may be psychological factors (e.g. 'determination').

Since you're not identical twins there could be a host of physiological reasons, many of which will be related to gender, why you're more capable at certain physical activities. You may well be able to outrun your sister, but her circulatory system could well be healthier than yours. Without rigorous tests, who knows?
posted by le morte de bea arthur at 2:31 AM on May 6 [1 favorite]

Sister? Girlfriend, sorry.
posted by le morte de bea arthur at 2:32 AM on May 6

There are millions and millions of women that are more fit than men of similar physical activity level.

You also can't use your own fitness as a characteristic example. There are a great many 300 pound guys that have your activity level.
posted by paperzach at 2:45 AM on May 6

Fitness tends to be measured in ways that suit male physiology eg testing upper body strength. This can work splendidly as a means of gender discrimination.
posted by Idcoytco at 3:32 AM on May 6 [5 favorites]

Idcoytco: "Fitness tends to be measured in ways that suit male physiology eg testing upper body strength. This can work splendidly as a means of gender discrimination."

Indeed. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Columbia_%28PSERC%29_v._BCGSEU for an example of this. The British Columbia forest ministry tried to institute a poorly designed fitness test to assess people's suitability for firefighting. The idea was that only those that passed the test were fit enough to fight fires and so, only those that passed the test could be candidates for hiring. They tried to fire an existing female employee who couldn't pass the test, despite her having successfully done the job for quite a while- meaning yes, the test wasn't quite a perfect test of the ability to do the actual job.
posted by demagogue at 3:50 AM on May 6 [1 favorite]

Not only is it difficult to draw true meaning out of individual cases (this is called anecdotal evidence by most research scientists), but keep in mind that as we progress through life, the actual medical standards on which we base judgments of fitness and health are also changing. BMI categories change, but so do things like cholesterol levels and so on.

And also I agree with Idcoytco and demagogue. There's lots of hard scientific evidence for both systematic/social trends that use these kinds of comparisons to power discriminatory behaviors as well as for individual examples (again anecdotal) of individuals and businesses using clearly "unfit" tests and test results to power/justify discriminatory practices at the workplace.
posted by kalessin at 4:54 AM on May 6

Er, but so do things like what's considered a healthy cholesterol level and so on. Sorry.
posted by kalessin at 4:55 AM on May 6

Whoa! Muscle vs. endurance. Both involve strength. And then there's pain threshold. Women tend to have better endurance and a higher pain threshold. This is just plain dumb (no offense to your girlfriend) because it is so stinkin' subjective. I think being fit is being healthy and active, both mentally and physically. You can't compare. It's apples and oranges, turtles and chickens. It's kind of like saying women are more attractive than men, or women are smarter than men or vice versa. What is your means to measure these attributes? Demagogue is right on. If you were to measure my fitness based on how fast I could run a mile, I'd be screwed. But measure my fitness on how well I can run a marathon and I'd beat a lot of people. Just an example.
posted by cachondeo45 at 4:59 AM on May 6

Are you more flexible than she is, also? Fitness is too vague a term for this argument.
posted by unknowncommand at 5:13 AM on May 6

Dipali Cunningham (a woman) just won the Sri Chinmoy 6-day race in New York outright, with 467 miles. This was substantially more than John Geesler's 433 miles.
posted by OmieWise at 6:17 AM on May 6 [1 favorite]

Yeah like other's have said I think this is a comment about muscle vs. bodyfat which is a stupid measure of fitness. There's a really, really good reason why men build muscle more easily and why women have higher bodyfat and this has nothing to do with fitness.
posted by ob at 6:47 AM on May 6

There's a definition of fitness that's floating around the net that's originally attributed to the founder of Dynamax and now used frequently by Crossfit. I like it for its breadth.

Fitness consists of ten general physical skills which cover every aspect of athletic activity: cardiovascular/respiratory endurance, stamina, strength, power, speed, flexibility, agility, accuracy, balance, and coordination.

Because of higher testosterone levels, man have an inherent advantage in building muscle mass which can translate to advantages in strength, power, and speed. There don't seem to be any significant natural differences between men and women in the other physical skills, at least that I'm aware of. So depending on what aspects of fitness you prefer to measure, you may be more or less fit than your girlfriend. For true fitness, many would argue that you need to develop all ten aspects listed above.

Also, I should point out, I work in a lab all day and even on days when I'm really busy, that kind of activity doesn't give any sort of fitness benefit.
posted by Durin's Bane at 6:51 AM on May 6 [2 favorites]

I would say that it's more accurate to claim, "Men are (on average) stronger and faster than women."

Generally speaking though, "fitness" refers to physical condition relative to survival and potential. Outside of a culture that encourages men to work physically, and discourages or actively prevents women from physical activity (foot-binding?), both sexes would be equally "fit". Certainly in America, men and women are approximately equally fit, with differing standards due to different physiologies.
posted by explosion at 6:51 AM on May 6

It is universally believed among women that if they gain a little weight, herculean measures must be taken to lose it, but if a man has a few extra pounds, he can simply skip lunch one day and he'll be back to normal. This is, of course, hyperbole, but women do start out with more fat than men and have less testosterone, as mentioned above. Women are not naturally "less fit" than men, just...curvier.
posted by misha at 7:09 AM on May 6

Well, women have more body fat for obvious reasons.

But I see more young men than young women who have let themselves get all beer belly.
posted by desuetude at 7:15 AM on May 6

I've seen data that says that men are not statistically stronger than women.

1. Women are not encouraged, from a very young age, to develop muscle, particularly upper body strength. Sports participation is relatively new to women as well. Then we have generations of nutritional differences. Aside from everything else, if you don't eat protein, and alot of it, your muscles won't work, they won't get bigger, and they won't burn calories.

2. Stronger people generally have "strength habits". They lift heavier things, they climb more stairs, they don't always notice it. If your gf hands you jars to open, for example, then you are doing more work than she is.

3. I simplify it. Everyone should be able to run a 7.5 minute mile, do 10 pull ups, and bench their body weight. But both of you should test yourselves against any multivariable standard you chose, and then you'll know where you really are.
posted by ewkpates at 7:25 AM on May 6

Yeah, we won't be able to tell you much until you tell us what you mean by "fit". Can you walk longer than her? Can you swim faster than her? Can you climb up a rope quicker? And if yes to any of these: did you do sports when you were younger? Did you take more swim lessons? Did you grow up with a better diet? Do you have longer limbs? Do you eat a better lunch? Do either of you smoke or did you used to smoke? Etc.

ewkpastes: that strikes me as an unbalanced test. Running a 7.5 minute mile is a lot easier than benching your body-weight.
posted by creasy boy at 7:47 AM on May 6

My ex husband used to upset me so much. I would go to the gym twice a week, and he would sit on his butt and program for 14 hours. Guess who could jump up out of their chair and just run a mile, cold? Yup. Bastard. He had almost no body fat too.
posted by The Light Fantastic at 7:58 AM on May 6

Everyone should be able to run a 7.5 minute mile

My top time was 11 minutes, when I was 17 and had trained for it all semester...so...maybe that's not a hard and fast rule. We're all not built for running (I'm a bit "top heavy").
posted by The Light Fantastic at 8:00 AM on May 6

When considering the proposition that "women are naturally less fit than men", we should be thinking of the general distribution of fitness across most women and most men. I know some women who have incredible fitness in some respect. Like one woman who can bench 300lbs, another who can run the mile in five minutes and change, and another woman who, even though she weighs only 90lbs, can do 20 pull-ups with a 20lb barbell between her ankles.

But, generally speaking, in most attributes that we relate to fitness, men have an innate advantage. Not all men over and above all women, but most men over and above most women. From "Durin's Bane" I'd give women an absolute advantage in only flexibility, and even in terms of endurance/cardiac fitness, I think the advantage still goes to men among people who are not highly trained athletes (and I base this on mile-run times that I remember from school, as well as the table of stats referred to in the link below).

Take a look at the President's Fitness Test for the 85th and 50th percentiles of school-age children.

I disagree with the suggestions that a lot of the discrepancy comes from how we socialize boys and girls--the boys and girls in elementary school show nearly identical performance that diverges suddenly in middle school.
posted by Maxwell_Smart at 9:06 AM on May 6

I read somewhere, a decade ago, and I can't find it, and that upsets me, more than my comma usage, that the AMA concluded that if you could run a 7.5 mintue mile you had a healthy heart.

Now we know (at least some of us) that heart disease is largely a result of air quality and has little to do with cholesteral and fat, but I think the number is a good one.

Why speed is important: running is hard, running fast is harder. If your heart can do that, you don't have to worry about improving your cardio performance much.

Why bench is important: You gotta have chest, tri's and shoulders. As you get older, these are key to maintaining body and bone mass.

Everybody will have a weakness: my rule of thumb is there to highlight where I think you should worry. I don't care how top heavy you are or how nimble you are... change the way you think, then change the way you train, then succeed.
posted by ewkpates at 9:20 AM on May 6

It is generally accepted that men have better upper body strength overall, while womens' strength is focused more on lower body. Flexibility, agility, and balance come easier to women. This is especially true because women generally have their center of balance lower on their bodies than men.
I can't find the article, but I read once that in an obstacle course that was being used by either police or the military, on the incline wall, men would pull themselves over with the rope, while women would walk/push themselves over with their legs and hips. But both could get over it equally well, just using different methods.
Women have more body fat, for obvious reasons, as someone said above. Women have to have a certain amount of fat to menstruate.
posted by fructose at 9:24 AM on May 6

--as for bone mass as you get older, women who are thinner are more likely to suffer from osteoporosis than women with more fat.
posted by fructose at 9:31 AM on May 6

Wow, I go to sleep and there's 25 comments.

Of course you guys are right in that fitness is very hard to define, but to answer some of your questions:

Yes, I did many sports when I was younger (we are 23 now, by the way), such as basketball, baseball, street hockey, cross-country, track, wrestling. BUT, my girlfriend started dancing from the age of 4 or something, and continued through college whereas I did very little exercise past my freshman year in high school.

Currently, I say I am more fit because I have a higher endurance (running), I have less fat, I have more muscle, I have more energy, etc.

While my girlfriend is a dancer, I may be about as flexible as her currently. We are not as flexible as we could be, but I was always an above average flexible guy.

So by fit, I'm not talking necessarily about strength or fat, but overall physical fitness. I would personally say I am more mentally fit as well, but she would probably disagree.
posted by mallow005 at 10:34 AM on May 6

I disagree with the suggestions that a lot of the discrepancy comes from how we socialize boys and girls--the boys and girls in elementary school show nearly identical performance that diverges suddenly in middle school.

What explanation is there for that divergence except for the difference in the way we socialize boys and girls? It's not coincidental that the divergence happens at puberty.
posted by desuetude at 11:02 AM on May 6

What explanation is there for that divergence except for the difference in the way we socialize boys and girls? It's not coincidental that the divergence happens at puberty.

What are you getting at? Or, what are your thoughts on the social/biological causes that change during puberty? I guess I should explain myself more clearly. My point was that even from a very young age children know the difference between "girl toys" and "boy toys" and pink=feminine and blue=masculine, and that skirts are for girls and so forth. That, basically, by the age of six or eight when boys and girls still show almost identical performance, they have already have a strongly identified sense of gender and know the stereotypes and expectations that go along with that.

So, my guess was that since discrepancies start to appear during puberty, they must be coming more from the influence of testosterone, say, than from differences in gender expectation that children have been exposed to their whole lives.
posted by Maxwell_Smart at 1:21 PM on May 6

So, my guess was that since discrepancies start to appear during puberty, they must be coming more from the influence of testosterone, say, than from differences in gender expectation that children have been exposed to their whole lives.

I think that this is oversimplifying the role of testosterone and under-examining the role of peer pressure.
posted by desuetude at 1:27 PM on May 6

I think that this is oversimplifying the role of testosterone and under-examining the role of peer pressure.

As an extremely fit woman, I think you are dead wrong. It may not be simply testosterone, but the fact that men put on muscle more easily and need less body fat than women simply makes them better athletic performers. Would that it weren't so, but trust me, it is.


3. I simplify it. Everyone should be able to run a 7.5 minute mile, do 10 pull ups, and bench their body weight.

You realize this is an incredibly male-centric standard, right? A woman that can bench press her body weight is generally a far more advanced athlete than a man that can do the same (even if you think those charts underestimate women, there is quite a magnitude of difference there).
The other Strength Standards are interesting to look at, to give you an idea of the magnitude of difference.
posted by ch1x0r at 4:22 PM on May 6 [1 favorite]

Evolutionarily speaking, "fitness" refers to one's ability to produce offspring. Take that for what it's worth.
posted by HotPatatta at 4:26 PM on May 6

ch1x0r, I don't disagree with you that men are better athletic performers, and that testosterone plays a significant role. You're speaking as an athlete, though, and I was addressing "general fitness" (acknowledging the vagueness there.)
posted by desuetude at 4:33 PM on May 6

Hotpatatta, in the extreme examples of reproductive fitness, men kick womens arses there many times over. Wasn't there a caliph who had several hundred children? While polygamous dads can have dozens of offspring. Women can only manage a dozen or more, tops.

Re general fitness, my wife is far fitter than me, she exercises maybe daily, while I do not very much at all. But I can still outsprint or out run her, armwrestle her, ride faster on a bike etc. She would have better stamina than me, but I would very quickly catch up on that measure.

Testosterone. There's a reason athletes inject it.
posted by wilful at 6:25 PM on May 6

Er I wouldn't say that... exactly.

There's the differences between men and women blah blah blah.

But then you have different muscle types, body types (ecto/endo)...

I build and retain muscle incredibly well, if I was a guy, I'd be pretty slamin' but does more muscle make me 'fitter'. The muscle would be bigger and a lot more dense. I'd be a hell of a lot stronger but then fat people are strong but they sure as hell aren't fit!

I think lifestyle would also play a massive part in it too...
Guys that haul big rocks around all day everyday in comparison to office chicks that... walk to work in their sneakers? Or some hard as fuck fire-fighting bitches - compared to a bunch of donut eating desk cops??
posted by mu~ha~ha~ha~har at 4:51 AM on May 7

It's not male centric, sorry. Women are weak.

There is no data indicating that women working out as hard in the gym, eating as much protein, AT ANY AGE, can't ramp up their bench to an acceptable level.

The table your linking really just suggests that women start out weaker and don't train as hard. Remember, no offense, but this is a group that says stuff like "I don't want to bulk up". Like some how a lack of muscle is more feminine. Well, that's what who we are working with.
posted by ewkpates at 5:08 AM on May 7

Some men are more fit than some women. Some women are more fit than some men. For pretty much any physical, mental, emotional, or social variable, the range among women and the range among men essentially overlap completely. Although the means are sometimes different, they are rarely statistically significantly different.
posted by hydropsyche at 6:29 AM on May 7

It's not male centric, sorry. Women are weak.

There is no data indicating that women working out as hard in the gym, eating as much protein, AT ANY AGE, can't ramp up their bench to an acceptable level.

The table your linking really just suggests that women start out weaker and don't train as hard. Remember, no offense, but this is a group that says stuff like "I don't want to bulk up". Like some how a lack of muscle is more feminine. Well, that's what who we are working with.

What are you talking about? Did you bother to read the descriptions of the levels from those charts? Clearly not, because your claim of "women don't train as hard" doesn't make any sense given that this is a chart of expected numbers given women that have trained to a certain level. There are probably fewer women as a percentage of the population even trying to reach intermediate/advanced levels than men, but for those women, they are going to hit lower numbers than men of the same size.
posted by ch1x0r at 6:42 AM on May 7

I think the categories are arbitrary. "Expert" fitness level doesn't mean anything, really. Lance Armstrong, for example, horrible bench press and pull up numbers both on and off season. He's not an expert. He's a specialist. So the categories are unreliable.

Also, much of this conversation revolves around anecdotal evidence. Here's some more. I was just at the gym (between posts) and I asked one of the managers about the training environment. It's a relatively hardcore gym... not alot of steroids users, but not alot of people who spend more money on outfits than on protein...

I asked him "Are women's bench presses lower than men's here, relative to their body weight?" He said absolutely, sure.

I asked him "Is this because they just aren't as strong or something, or is it a training issue?" He said that the trainers can't get women to work their upper bodies. Trainers have to "make them do it". He said the gym has added in extra upper body to all their female-centric aerobics classes because it's such a challenge to get women to train upper body.

Every study I've ever seen, old young whatever, the data shows that lifting and eating protein builds muscle in both sexes. It might be slower in women, sure... but there's no reason to believe a 115 pound person, of either gender, can't train up to a 115 pound bench.
posted by ewkpates at 10:14 AM on May 7

Every study I've ever seen, old young whatever, the data shows that lifting and eating protein builds muscle in both sexes. It might be slower in women, sure... but there's no reason to believe a 115 pound person, of either gender, can't train up to a 115 pound bench.

You must be misreading what I am saying. I am not saying that women cannot ever bench press their body weight. I am saying that for a given woman to bench press her body weight, she has to work at it a lot harder than a man of the same size. Trainers at your gym telling you that women in general don't want to train their upper body is sad but I am certain true, but that does not change the fact that even for a woman that wants to train her upper body, she has to work harder than a guy to achieve the same proportional strength. This is not anecdotal bullshit I am spewing at you; if you think that all women need to do is believe in the Secret and they will suddenly be lifting as much as men, you need a refresher course in human physiology.
posted by ch1x0r at 8:11 PM on May 7

1. let's say it is true that women have less upper body mass than men. Certainly this is true of anyone who goes to the gym regularly, because we accept that women who do Train don't train upper body sufficiently. Why do women who don't train have less upper body strength relative to body mass compared to men who don't train? I am going to go with a) women generally consume less protein than men; b) inactive women 18-35 are generally less active than inactive men 18-35. They have higher ratio of muscle to body mass in every catagory.

Again, it's about training and eating, training and eating. Nothing suggests that women have slower growth factors for certain muscle groups (chest or back or legs) compared to men. They may have slower growth factors overall, but not by muscle group.

2. This is a vitally important debate. Long term health issues are directly associated with lack of muscle mass. People who train women, and women themselves, have to take bench more seriously. It's not a man's exercise. (I'm not saying that anyone suggested that it is.) I know several hard working women amateur athletes. They can't bench their body weight, they can't do pull ups, and nobody tells them it’s a problem (well, other than me).
posted by ewkpates at 5:33 AM on May 8

Some relevant stuff about the sports differences of boys and girls from the NYT (middle of page).

I don't like the article's implicit criticism of the Title IX provision -- don't demand that money is spent wisely (for either girls or boys), just stop the girls having any. Subsidize masculine excitement in clashes of the Titans, not health.
posted by Idcoytco at 4:01 AM on May 13

I don't read that as a criticism of Title IX, but as a very real consequence. We are tranforming from a culture where women are inactive to one where they are active. This transformation will involve a learning curve as we see that women face different risks in the athletic arena than men do.

This reminds me of the debate in medical circles... for many years medical research has been done more or less exclusively on men. We are now beginning to realize that the data that generates doesn't necessary apply to women. Our cultural reluctance to involve women in medical research caused a gap: we know women don't always respond the same way to drugs and therapies, but we don't know any more than that.
posted by ewkpates at 9:22 AM on May 13

1. let's say it is true that women have less upper body mass than men. Certainly this is true of anyone who goes to the gym regularly, because we accept that women who do Train don't train upper body sufficiently.

Not all women who train do not train upper body sufficiently, which is the point that you seem to be stubbornly missing. I am not talking about the average woman that goes to the gym and totally neglects upper body work. I am talking about women like myself that train hard and heavy, not shying away from any sort of exercise and eating plenty of protein. And even for those women, the bar of bench pressing body weight and doing ten pull-ups is significantly harder than it is for men. This is for two major reasons: one, that yes women do have slower growth factors overall. Two: bench pressing your weight is a direct factor of your weight. For a fit man, that weight is proportionally less fat than for a fit woman probably by a good 8-10%. You and I both weigh 120, but you are 10% bodyfat and I am 20% bodyfat. You've got more pounds of muscle to contribute to doing that lift. Similarly with the pull-ups, which are also directly affected by your body weight.

They can't bench their body weight, they can't do pull ups, and nobody tells them it’s a problem (well, other than me).

Really? You and your friends sound quite out of touch as far as modern women's weight training goes. I know many women that can bench their body weight and do pull-ups. I actually think benching your body weight is a fairly stupid measure of fitness unless you're competing in powerlifting, because there are better ways to build and maintain whole body muscle and bone mass. They're called squats and deadlifts. If you want to rant about fitness standards, you would do better ranting about a couple that women neglect for really stupid reasons.
posted by ch1x0r at 10:02 AM on May 18 [1 favorite]