Don't worry, as you get older you will be put in junior divisions where the boys and girls are in separate divisions.

i don't compete any more. i don't see the value, but i think thats another topic (a very exhausted one) entirely.

In my opinion, if a girl is going to enter a co-ed competition or a practice fight, she should know what she's getting herself into. If I were to enter a co-ed competition, I wouldn't want my opponents to hold back because I would want the experience to show the areas I'm weak in.

(I think you should have gone for that silver! )

Just as well you weren't born a male Black Widow spider or a Praying Mantis....

I know this topics been dead for a few days... but I'd just like to add...

If a girl stands toe to toe with me in a competition. I will not take it easy on her. I'll fight her the same as if I was fighting a guy. She chose to be there. She trained as much as I have. She trained in fighting... and a lot of girls want to prove themselves.... and I know for a fact that it's going to be hell on my end for that reason.

I'm a girl, and in general my instructor tries to match me against girls. But when I fight against guys I have more respect for them if they go their hardest on me, since I'm not a weak little girl and can defend myself and hit back. We're sparring as equals. I don't even pay attention to the genders. Personally I would be very annoyed if I saw a guy fight excellently against another guy, and then when it came to be my turn to go easier because I'm a girl. Fighting easier against me isn't going to make me any better.

In ICMAA events there is not a seperation between girls and boys, they will spar each other in continuous sparring competiton, the seperation starts at the 18 year old age bracket, then wemon will compete each other and the men each other.

My 15 year old daughter won 2nd place in the power hands competition (metered focus mitt) competeing against boys her age, I could see the agony in the faces when she hit harder than most of the boys , trust me it really showed in the sparring competition, she came in second again and was hitting the boys just as hard as they were hitting her.

Me , I learned the hard way while competing, a friend of mine wife really took it to me during a finals match, she was not holding nothing back , but torward the end I got over the I'm not hitting a girl stuff and decided that I had took enough beating and started giving it back...I ended up beating her by 1 point....ever since then man or women, it dosent matter, you step up , you had better be ready to play hard ball.

I'm a female and I'd say that women don't enter competitions so they can be taken easy on. If I won a competition because my opponent was going "aw, she's small/ a girl/ etc etc", I'd be annoyed because it wouldn't be in my eyes a proper win. I'd want both sides to try hard.

In my view, women enter to compete and do their best. So do men. How would you feel if somebody looked at you, and then took it easy on you because of who you were? I bet you wouldn't like it, well, if it was me, I wouldn't like it. This is a place where you are supposed to hit, and the women who join, normally know what they are getting into.

Also, you could think of it as making sure women are more ready for the "real" world? I know the rules of competition are very different to getting attacked in the street/ in your home, but in real life, attackers don't take it easy. I entered my first competition to test my abilities, see how much I had learned, and get a taste or what it is like to actually be in a fight, even if the fight had rules and was much more fair than the street. Then after the fight, I knew what to brush up on and concentrate on improving, so I could improve my skills and if there was really no other way, I could fight better in a real attacker situation. If you fight a woman, you might learn a few things yourself.

There is a big difference between bullying and fighting fairly in a competition that the female has said "yes, I'll fight in this". Try your best You might actually be surprised at how good and challenging some women are at fighting.

Hope I've got through what I was trying to say. More or less;

taking it easy on a women in competition = boring and disappointing for both of you, and not the best learning experience



Ooh, just a little note; where I have trained, we fight with both males and females, and swap regularly with who we are fighting with. Sometimes we even get put purposefully with a male as our partner, so we are not used to just fighting against our own gender. In that way, sometimes I am more likely to be fighting and sparing with a guy, than with a girl!

well, I used to have this problem. However, the dojo i attended had vicious females, so it didn't take much time for me to realize that letting loose of my morals was better than getting my ass kicked each and every time.

I spar a few girls at my dojang, they seemed to be very fast. So it was good training to get a contrast in style, i am one of the fastest guys in my school, but the girls are still faster most of the time.