{
  "abstract": "Women’s sport is experiencing its most explosive growth in history: record-breaking performances, expanding professional opportunities and increased participation. Yet women continue to face sport-specific barriers, such as breast discomfort and self-consciousness, menstrual cycle experiences and poorly fitting equipment, which can contribute to reduced participation. 1 The 2025 Female, Woman and/or Girl Athlete Injury pRevention consensus found that fewer than 40% of injury prevention studies included female/woman/girl-specific data,2 highlighting a knowledge gap essential to understanding female/woman/girl performance and injury risk. This research gap translates directly to the playing field, where key athletic considerations, including product design (ie, sports equipment, apparel and training/rehabilitation devices), remain grounded in male-derived data models. This problem persists despite growing evidence of both sex-specific (anatomical, biomechanical and hormonal) and gender-specific (sociocultural) differences between male/man/boy and female/woman/girl athletes.3 This mismatch illustrates the ‘performance-injury paradox’, a phenomenon wherein female/woman/girl athletes achieve unprecedented performance levels while facing elevated injury risk, in part because the equipment and systems intended to support them remain largely designed for male/man/boy athletes (figure 1). While this editorial will primarily focus on product design innovations for athletes displaying female sex characteristics—referred to herein as ‘female athletes’—we recognise substantial overlap in anatomical and biomechanical traits across sexes and the diversity that exists within female, woman and girl athletes. Gendered systems and structures also contribute to the performance-injury paradox. All athletes, regardless of sex or gender identity, require appropriate equipment. For many, these needs would be best met by equipment designed with their sex-specific characteristics in mind.",
  "authors": [
    {
      "affiliations": [
        "Department of Biomedical Physiology & Kinesiology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada"
      ],
      "name": "Ine Mylle"
    },
    {
      "affiliations": [
        "Department of Physical Therapy, The University of British Columbia Faculty of Medicine, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada",
        "British Columbia Injury Research and Prevention Unit, BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada"
      ],
      "name": "Allison M Ezzat"
    },
    {
      "affiliations": [
        "Department of Biomedical Physiology & Kinesiology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada"
      ],
      "name": "Jessica Yeoman"
    },
    {
      "affiliations": [
        "Department of Biomedical Physiology & Kinesiology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada"
      ],
      "name": "Kaylee White"
    },
    {
      "affiliations": [
        "Department of Biomedical Physiology & Kinesiology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada"
      ],
      "name": "Sophia F Wisotzki"
    },
    {
      "affiliations": [
        "Department of Biomedical Physiology & Kinesiology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada"
      ],
      "name": "Christopher Napier"
    }
  ],
  "title": "Built for her? Female athletes are still competing in a system optimised for bodies that are not their own",
  "uid": "73848141-46fd-56b7-8725-546702280aea"
}