100 Women: Do the Olympics have a gender gap?

There were no women athletes at the first modern Olympic Games, in 1896, because its founder, Pierre de Coubertin, thought women were “not cut out to sustain certain shocks”.

More than 100 years later, Reality Check finds that women’s participation in the Summer Olympics has grown, but across the Olympic movement, the gender gap still exists.

Enshrined in the International Olympic Committee (IOC) charter is the commitment to “encourage and support the promotion of women in sport at all levels”.

This would suggest the IOC no longer thinks along the lines of Pierre de Coubertin. But let’s take a closer look – starting with the sportswomen who participate.  More

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