Why I Need IronGirl (a Personal Account)

By Melissa Emery

Women younger than me (41) are never going to believe this (I wish I had photos), but here goes . . .

I want to thank Ryka, IronGirl and Rob Vigorito for holding a women-only triathlon because it will be one of the first times that I, as a woman, will be encouraged and treated as equal in sport.

And because I won't have to wear a dress & bloomers while racing. That's right - a DRESS & BLOOMERS.

First Anecdote
I grew up in Baltimore County and received my entire grade-school education in Baltimore County Public Schools. Up until about 1980 (a few years after Title IX), girls in my school system still had to wear a cream-colored, short-sleeved, cotton/poly blend dress AND bloomers (ask your mother what those are if you're too young to know) in gym class. If you didn't wear the dress, you couldn't participate in gym and if you didn't participate in gym, you failed the class. Now, what kind of message do you think that sent to young women in the late 70's? "You can 'play' at sports, but sports aren't for boys, young lady.  Now, go bake or knit something." I mean, come on! A damn dress (it had snaps up the front and a cute breast pocket). At least we were allowed to wear sneakers.

This type of thing sent a message loud and clear to my generation and those who came before me that sports were really for men. The best sportswoman in my school (I will never forget her - Margie Trott - she was phenomenal in every sport) went to the Naval Academy because - among other reasons - sports scholarship money for women just didn't really exist in the early 1980s.

My sister, on the other hand, who is a couple years younger than me, didn't have to wear a dress for gym class because she went to Friends School (a private school). She was pretty athletic and really good at soccer, but she had to play on the BOY'S TEAM because they didn't even have a girl's team! (remember this was back in the 1970's) Why didn't they have a girl's team? "Girls playing soccer? Huh? That's a boy's sport."

My generation of women really missed out on the benefits of the feminist movement & Title IX, so I'm thrilled to have a world-class event being held for ME.

Second Anecdote
My generation of women has (or had, in my case) mothers who were born in the 1920's and 1930's, for the most part. My mother, typically, was raised in New York by a conservative and strict father who felt it was not appropriate for young women to engage in sport of any kind. Two things my mother always regretted not learning how to do were swim and ride a bike. But, she made damn sure her daughters knew how to do those two things. When I think back on it now, it's truly ironic that the two things she absolutely wanted me and my sister to be able to do was swim and bike. So, Thanks Mom! for making it possible for me to participate in triathlon without having to learn from scratch as an adult; and Thanks Dad! for teaching me how to swim & ride a bike.

And, thanks Vig, for giving us older chicks a race we deserve!

Melissa dug out her junior high school yearbooks and found this photo - Girls Basketball at Dumbarton Junior High School (circa 1979)