Tobin Heath & Demi Vollering Talk Women's Sports

[@SuzetteCallejo]

Great interview Tobin. Seeing this post tour. Demi’s performance on Alp D’uez was mind blowing. Def best rider out there.

[@Cappy609]

Great interview. I hope I live long enough to see the women’s grand tours extended to 3 weeks with equal pay and prize money.

[@stevemahoney1733]

If future tours continue to be as good as this years, the sponsorship & money will come. I'm not sure we will ever get to three week tours for the women.

[@Miekzz]

A link up I didn't know I needed - two absolute legends of their sports, love seeing them chat :)

[@KatieKookaburra]

This is such a great interview! Love to see more of these. Well done Strava for doing this.

[@MelatiJosephus]

Great interview! Finally women from different sports talking to each other - we need more of this

[@401SNelson]

I love watching women’s cycling especially cyclocross. Demi is one of my favorite riders.

[@DerrickAbucheri]

My two faves together. I love this!

[@maanvis81]

Thanks for this interview!! I love Demi Vollering, I hope she wins the tour again this year!

[@franktadley1810]

That was a great interview. Watch Stage 4 and see Demi and Puck duel it out. Great racing and sweet tactics.

[@caitlinblack13]

Love the gender bias topic and transparency xo

[@TheAsianDavid]

Just two GOATs, chatting in up.

[@naomiroyal7508]

Tobin is such a legend❤

[@Betzyfv]

lovely interview, I just wish it could last 3 hours. Also please let us know when Demi is doing Mandeville.

[@lucymannall]

Yess!

[@lucymannall]

We NEED more Tobin in cycling!

[@Melii1128]

Yesss Tobin! 🔥

[@bernardo9202]

Great interview and clearly the woman sports need to grow and get more sponsors and viewership. But, bringing up a lawsuit against the US football federation, that made them lose more money than they would accepting the deal they gave them, is crazy. Also, the sport is growing, the TDF is in the 3 edition with 10 stages, Men's edition is over 100 years, 21 stages and bigger teams, sponsors and viewership. The mentality should be, is not I what I want, is about, I'm on the path of getting this for future athletes, like so many great champions did before for those who are competing today in the men side of things. Getting paid 1 milli is great comparing the two sides of the sport, the final stage of the TDF where Demi did one of the best races in the history of the sport, was only covered for 1/5 of the full legth of the stage, prioritizing the men's Vuelta and a boring sprint stage. Hope the sport grows as much as it can, and having Strava behind it is just great!

[@Katsoles717]

Love the advice! Slow hours are amazing for building an aerobic base. It’s counter intuitive but trust the process.

[@6betoman6]

I agree that female riders, and specially Demi, are underpaid. However, I believe Tobin’s lack of knowledge regarding the economics of cycling teams and races shows in this interview. She clearly doesn’t know how hard it is to get title sponsors in cycling, even more for a women’s team. Many professional men’s teams have dissolved due to lack of funding, so expecting female riders to get paid more without advocating firstly for the growth of the sport is wrong.

[@6betoman6]

To add to that, they first need to equal the number of stages before equaling the prize money. It doesn’t have to be the same total kms, but at least the same number of stages.

[@gearmonger8616]

YES and even a lack of understanding of the evolution of football/soccer. Let's focus on the positive growth women's cycling has experienced and push forward. The language matters but only in a historical context that Heath can't seemingly understand .

[@bernardo9202]

Also the prize pool for the TDF is a joke, i think Tadej with so many stage wins and overall GC, only won 300k, that is very little in the grand scheme of things

[@stevemahoney1733]

I find it troubling that in 2024 one of the women on the US team which chose guaranteed salary with full medical benefits is still talking about the pay gap. The men's team signed a different contact which was risk / reward orintated. There are so many articles / videos which give multiple examples of why this is false, yet here we are again.

[@GorillaPower500]

Why can't I find Tobin's Strava profile??

[@NeverTakeNoCut-offs]

"Deserve" has nothing to do with anything in life, much less sports.

[@razmataz13drums]

To be completely fair on the professional question, it might be something I'd think, because, I watch mostly women's rugby, and most teams are not professional. So I don't equate being professional to not being good or not being as credible etc. If anything it's more like, please say you're getting paid and have training and insurance etc

[@arthurkillen396]

Nice interview. You could sense their genuine excitement for cycling. I'm jealous of Demi's speed, but I'll forgive her if she agrees to marry me.

[@Nangoncrazy]

I'm about to write the longest comment I've ever written but please bear with me. Also I'm gonna be very blant at times since I don't want to write even more than I'm about to do. Lastly, I hope Demiz the interviewer and Strava will see this post, since I'm very passionate about cycling i general, be it the mens or woman's TdF and I don't mean anything condescending or bad toward the woman's TdF or cycling womans sport in general. I just want to make an objective point about the poorly discussed topic in this interview from a mens perspective. So... 1. The interviewer is not suitable for this discussion, since she doesn't know a lot about cycling in general and just focuses on the narrative that woman don't get equal pay compared to the men which takes a lot of credibility from her and the interview in general as well as the approach on that difficult topic. So that's already bad. Now let's talk about why woman get generally paid less in sports. 1. From a biological standpoint. Men are physically superior to woman. Generally speaking, of course not in all aspects, but when it comes to sports that's usually the case. That's just how it is. I don't mean that in a bad way. Just stating the obvious. Period. 2. Who watches sports, who is interested in sports? Mainly men. If you compare men to women, a lot more men watch/are interested in sports compared to women. Which means mens sports is also generally speaking bigger than the womans sport. Market is just bigger. Like the market for modeling is bigger for woman, because generally soeaking woman are more interested in that kind of sector. 3. Basic economics when looking at the previous point. Bigger market equals more money, more money equals more money for the athletes. That's basically why men get more money. Now how do you make women's sport and in that case the Tour de france femme bigger? 1. Definitely not with the problem focused on the additional suffix femme. That's basically there to identify if we talk about the mens or women's TdF. You could also just use the suffix for the mens TdF, i couldn't care less. So how do you tackle the problem. Woman just need to work on their sport in general and need to stop crying about more money without actually doing something that legitimizes the more money. Woman get paid less because of the different points i stated before. Less people interested in general, while the audience is still mainly man, so maybe try to make more woman watch your own sport!! Then people want to see the best and that is in sports just mostly the performance of men not woman, also the market is just bigger for men so more money for men. My solution for the TdF to get bigget and get mote money to the athletes. In short. The sport just needs to get more professional. A lot more professional. Meaning... The performance of the general female rider is a lot worse compared to the male rider when it comes to the sport. How do you tackle that. Well you gotta nutrture4the womans cycling sport. How do you do that? AS A WOMAN YOU TRY TO APPEAL TO YOUNG WOMAN AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. meaning better structures, longer races, and therfore generally a wider pool of talent which will increase the performance of the peloton. You can't ask for equal pay when your performance sucks. The men will always be better from an absolute perspective. Cant change that. The thing is though that when tou look at it comparatively the woman just need to get better, so they are on the same level as men. So as a woman I'd just put my power into flourish4the sport and elivate it in general so the more money comes naturally because the performance in general is better. Which means the money is really and honestly earned. Not meant in a bad way but for comparison just look at modeling and the pay gap there between men and woman. Woman get paid so much more for modelling4that men. Why? Because the market is bigger and woman are generally speaking more interested in that kind of field than men. Men generally speaking don't give a F about modeling and the whole fashion market? So should we also cry for more money without the actual legitimation for it? No.. The more money5just isn't there or we as men need to work on making the market bigger. What I wanna say is. There are biological/natural restrictions for womans sport, there is generally speaking less interest in sports for woman. Because men watch men, and woman usually don't watch a lot of sports. Even womans sport is mostly watched my men.. So just do more for your own sport, the things i mentioned before. Get woman into the sport, you got all the power. You want more money, then do something about it and earn it, you don't want the pity price. You got all the power. I know men did a lot of awful things in the past regarding woman's sport. But that's in general not the case anymore. Af least all the young people nowadays don't have that mindset anymore. So just work on it, get more professional, get more women involved in sports. And the money will come. I think you'll never be able to fully equal the money that is in mens sports due to the limitations and different interests of men and women in general that i stated earlier but you can increase the market by a lot just through putting in your own work in your respective sport. I really don't mean anything hete condescending, i just want to state the obvious since i think it is aweful to hide behind false narratives which just takes away all the power, the real power that women have in their own sports. Just do your thing and grow. You don't need men or pity prices to rich equal or a bigger market/pay in your sport. Just involve more people, get better in general and money comes. If not then it is how it is. But you can't ask for more money when there isn't the market. That approach takes away your own power and legitimation for the sport. Thats the wrong approach.

[@robinwhg]

I'm all for athletes being payed but this interview completely leaves out or dismisses the reasons why women get payed less so it just comes off as whining. That's a problem of the whole discussion in general.

[@user-d32658]

Welcome to woke in sports. We’ll just pay everybody the same independent from results, sponsor deals and number of viewers and the money to fund it will grow on trees. 😂

[@zikaperic2133]

Everybody is try to hit on Demi

[@nick358]

Who is the dude on the left

[@stevenmeyer9674]

I wish I could have enjoyed this interview with Demi more. Unfortunately the interviewer had very little knowledge of how pro racing works. It made watching very frustrating.

[@SuzetteCallejo]

More eyes on women’s cycling the better. Tobin is former USWNT soccer player with a huge reach and an advocate for all women’s sports. I’m so glad she has focus on this now.

[@cyclingfreak56]

How is it not demeaning to women to have to ride 1/3 the days and 1/2 the length as the men and still be called a Grand Tour? Even the one day races are embarrassingly short. At least in the gravel world the amazing women compete at the same level as the men! The UCI needs to wake up and let these women compete on an equal field if there is to be equality in road cycling.

[@mracer8]

The current women pro peloton don’t have enough rider of the caliber need to have longer tour, same reason why you don’t see long stage race of any gender in America.

[@strupotter]

Tell me you don't watch womens cycling without telling me

[@bernardo9202]

I cannot understand how Portugal, Germany, UK, USA that have minor men's races, don't go all out on the women side of things and invest on getting a real Grant Tour for them and get greater revenue from it

[@mettacitta2000]

Please do your homework first, the person in charge of the Tour and route is Marlene Rousse, ex pro cyclist who takes its development very seriously. The Tour will evolve with the safety of the riders as paramount but dont expect it to be the same route as the men's purely for your viewing pleasure

[@Asin1155]

Can she stop saying "like"? The interviewer has great personaltiy and energy, but she needs to stop saying "like" every 5 words. She said more "like" in 5 min than I have been dropped on a ride, which is a lot. And can't pronounce alp d'huez - it might be her way to sound cool and hipster, but nah

[@williamsurks4644]

She’s not an interviewer

[@xxxxxMiri]

If you don't have anything nice to say....

[@bernardo9202]

@@xxxxxMiri just say it anyways, because they are trying to get better content for the next interview