(Podcast) WNBA’s Chantelle Anderson: blogging about female athletes, lesbians and her image in the sports industry

On Friday, I conducted one of my favorite interviews – an informed telephone conversation with Chantelle Anderson who plays for the WNBA’s Atlanta Dream.

Chantelle touched on many different points in this interview, but this discussion was not centered upon her role on the court.

Instead, it’s formulated around some of the topics that Chantelle has brought up off the court on her blog, and they have to do with the image and sexual orientation of modern female athletes. Read more

Stringer rightfully complains about Rutgers’ failure to market her program

Rutgers women’s basketball team have done it again – they’re on their fourth trip to the elite eight in five years. That’s pretty amazing.

But in an article released on NJ.com today, head women’s basketball coach Vivian Stringer was not happy.

In fact, she was just the opposite (and rightfully so). She was quoted as complaining about the athletics department’s inability to effectively market a program that has been incredibly successful in recent years.

I have to say, I agree with her.

And speaking out was a great way to put some pressure on their new athletic director, Tim Pernetti.

But the answer is more than just installing a  flashy scoreboard or having smoke come out when the girls run on the floor.

It has to do with engaging directly with your audience, creating fans.

For example, get your athletes online. Have them blog. Get them on Twitter, have them respond to their fans. Hold contests through Facebook. Partner with third party sites like womentalksports.com (disclosure, I am co-founder of this site) to get these ideas out there.

These ideas aren’t new.The fans will come if you earn their respect, I assure you. In fact, if you’re looking for a good role model, check out what women’s pro soccer is doing – they’re leading the way for other women’s sports teams to follow.

In the mean time, keep winning. Keep speaking out about what’s unfair. Your fans will come.

Check out the rest of this article (it’s an interesting one), here: NJ.com on Rutgers Women’s Basketball.

Mechelle Voepel, renown sportswriter, welcome to the blogosphere

Late last night, by accident, in searching for women’s basketball blogs, I came across a name I recognized. Mechelle Voepel. I was thrilled to discover that in October of 08, she started her own blog.

For those of you who don’t know her, Mechelle Voepel can likely be considered the voice of women’s sports, particularly in the realm of women’s basketball.

Voepel has a longstanding column on Espn.com, and (until this year) had a popular women’s sports column at the Kansas City Star.

It’s obvious that the blog I came across is Voepel’s personal blog, as she writes in first person and describes her experiences first-hand.  We get to hear , how she feels about major events in women’s sports, as well as personal views about the industry in general.

This perception is perhaps the first of its kind for women’s sports journalists, and her insight can be appreciated by every sports fan, especially those with a love for women’s basketball.

In reading Voepel’s blog, you get to hear about her experience and opinions of the industry from her point of view. She’s no longer talking in third person. Instead, she’s giving her own perception and recounting her experiences.

So I invite you… all of you out there who see this… to read her blog.

If you choose to do so, you will be acquainted with the following:

You can read about what it’s like to be given the opportunity to cover women’s sports:

“For The Star, I have covered events such as the Women’s Final Four, the Women’s World Cup, the U.S. Women’s Open and the Solheim Cup. The newspaper took a leadership role in its commitment to women’s sports. There were so many times over the last dozen years I felt immense gratitude that The Star didn’t just give lip service to diversity of coverage. The paper consistently made it happen _ when plenty of bigger papers didn’t. It made me very proud to work for a place like that.”

You can also read Voepel paying tribute to her heroine – suffragist Susan B. Anthony – on election day:

“I rode my bicycle to a church just a couple of minutes from my house and voted in a national, state and local election. I was wearing the first thing I grabbed out of my dresser – not an uncommon occurrence – which happened to be my 2002 Women’s Final Four T-shirt and blue shorts.

In other words, I just did something that I know that my hero and idol never did get to do. She spent her whole life working to give me that right. Susan B. Anthony, how can I ever begin to thank you?”

We get to read her opinion on the economic-stimulated loss of the Houston Comets.

“The WNBA’s Houston Comets are officially gone. I don’t hold the view that this means some kind of impending doom for the WNBA (there’s more on that in my ESPN.com blog). But I know that there are Comets fans feeling pain that I can relate to.”

You can read her opinion about how Tennessee’s comeback against Rutgers was anything but stunning:

“But … instead, let’s talk about why Tennessee won this game. And why it wins games like this year after year after year against teams – including very, very good teams _ from every conference. Sure, Tennessee always has plenty of talent and often dominates foes. However, Tennessee’s “escapes” from games in which it doesn’t play as well throughout have been so numerous and fearless that they make the work of Houdini appear like that of an adolescent who’s practiced with his store-bought magic kit for a couple of weeks before his “gig” at a pre-schooler’s birthday party.”

And there’s much, much more.

I’d like to welcome Mechelle to the world of women’s sports blogging. It’s great to see you here.

However, I have a challenge.

My challenge to Mechelle is to make the below changes to her blog. This will drive traffic, amplify her voice, and establish her presence as a leader in this industry. She has the credentials. She just needs people to hear what she has to say.

1) Encourage colleagues in her network to blog. I’m sure has an internal network who is knowledgeable about a wide range of women’s sports. We need more voices, more opinions, and more links. We need people like Mechelle to encourage them to start writing.

2) Link to existing women’s sports bloggers. Linking to us, reading us and engaging with us will create a community that will amplify her voice. Where’s her blogroll? Why am I (and other bloggers) not on it? Take a look at my blogroll – it’s a great place to start.

3) She needs to join Twitter and start using it. There aren’t enough people in Twitter discussing women’s sports. We need voices like hers to join, network, and share short, quick thoughts about games and results.

4) Get her own URL. Mechelle needs to purchase MechelleVoepel.com and redirect her blog to that address. This is an easy thing to do. It will help with branding and search optimization.

5) Promote her blog on ESPN. I’m sure ESPN would not mind getting some links every once and awhile. By promoting her personal blog on ESPN, she will drive some traffic, again, amplifying her voice.

6) Register on Technorati. It’s easy. This will help other bloggers get to know who (and where) she is.

7) Register on Blogher. Don’t you think it’s time that other women (besides those who area already acquainted with women’s sports) get to hear Mechelle’s commentary? I’d love to see her content syndicated on the women’s sports page.

Again, Mechelle – it’s great to see you here, and congratulations. Can’t wait to keep reading your posts.

(Interview) Because She Played… Erica Ortiz, Professional Drag Racer

My day job, I am a marketing and events coordinator for a company that manufactures broadcast equipment. I do some side consulting for the motorsports industry as well. But on the weekends and every other second of my spare time, my passion is drag racing. Drag Racing is the all out acceleration from a dead stop, as fast as you can go in a 1/4 mile or 1320ft. distance. I have been racing since 1998, and turned PRO in 2006.

Normally, people who race came about it through a family member that races, or some other mechanical aspect. My parents could hardly change a tire, so they find it very puzzling that I ended up having this passion for racing. I can remember being little and looking out the window of our painfully practical and all-around boring sedan at all the Mustangs and other hotrods on the road, and really being in awe of them. My favorite toys when I was little were little cars, not the Barbies my Mom wanted me to play with. When I got in my teen years, that passion for cars really grew. I was a 3 sport Varsity athlete in high school- Volleyball, Basketball, and Track. I actually had a full scholarship for Volleyball, but a severe auto accident the summer before my freshman year in college sidelined me from sports. The only release I had was to compete in cars, so after I graduated high school, I bought my first car- a Mustang GT, and started taking it out to the local track for Street Night. I’ve been hooked ever since.

Shortly after that, I started hanging out at a local speed shop with local star racer, Dennis Lugo. I ended up working there with him, and he taught me how to work on my engines, and really taught me the ropes of racing. My car progressively got faster. I started competing in a racing series, and ended up finishing #2 in my class in 2003, my first full year on the tour. I decided to move up to PRO in 2006, and finished #2 for the season in my rookie year there as well.

Though more women are out there today than when I started back in 1998, Drag Racing is still very much a male-dominated sport. Because it usually is such a unique story, women racing do tend to get more media attention. For the most part, that is a very good thing. However, as we have seen with IRL driver, Danica Patrick, you also tend to be scruntized much more and criticized for your every action. What that means is that as you are going through the learning curve process, they have a microscope on you. Any mistake you make (and believe me, all drivers make mistakes- male or female) spurns all the negative criticism that you can’t “cut it as a driver”. The truth is, all rookies make mistakes, the men just don’t have the magnifying glass over them for theirs.

The great thing about motorsports is that its the one sport where men and women can compete evenly…. the cars know no gender. But these cars are extremely expensive, and require the help of corporate and product sponsorships as you move up the ranks. Better equipment means faster times and makes you more competitive, so obviously the better funded racer has more chances of winning. Being a woman and also hispanic, I am able to offer a very different demographic to my sponsors. Because we are so rare in the sport, women tend to get more coverage and more mainstream appeal than male counterparts. This is a big selling point to sponsors…. win or lose, their car will make the press and thus reach their audience in a big way.

Sponsorships in drag racing are some of the most beneficial marketing dollars companies can spend because it provides them with a very wide array of marketing and promotional abilities. Everything from signage on the car (viewed by spectators, TV, magazines, etc), apparel, corporate hospitality, on-site event promotion, endorsements, printed promotions and hero card handouts, etc. are used as tools to give sponsors exposure and a ROI. My team makes sure that we are very proactive in getting exposure for the companies we represent. We have been featured in countless magazine articles (http://www.horsepowerandheels.com/Media/Print/Index.htm), we created our own TV Series (http://www.horsepowerandheels.com/TV/index.htm), and we stay active promoting the team, and our sponsors on a daily basis. BRISK USA (http://www.briskusa.com/), my main sponsor for 2008, started off as a product sponsor in 2006 and we really worked to get them exposure for their products. They were so impressed by the results, they decided to step up in 2007 to help us bring out a more competitive car. We work very hard to make sure ALL our sponsors are getting a very worthwhile response out of their association with Horsepower & Heels.

Although it would seem that after years of competing and especially how much more marketing appeal we have, that sponsorships would be easy for female drivers. However, I found out the hard way that the glass ceiling is still strongly in place. I’ve been told before that a sponsor still feels that he isn’t sure a woman could handle “a beast of a car like that” and that they are looking for a champion and to win races. Doesn’t matter that women have proven they can win…. the mental thought is still that a man can “get the job done”. Unfortunately, its a double-edged sword. Because you rely on sponsorships to fund a competitive car, women can only be as succesful as their funding allows. Until one is given the chance with a championship budget, we’ll always be running for 2nd best.

When I started racing, I very much wanted to be accepted, wanted to prove that I was able to compete with the men and be good at what I do. But after awhile, I found myself trying to “be one of the boys” to be out there competing with them. It was almost as though I was apologizing for being me… for being feminine and girly and still wanting to be a fierce competitor at the track. I didn’t like that…. and one day, when a fellow racer expressed his absolute disbelief that I wore heels to a dinner banquet it came to me: Who says Horsepower & Heels don’t mix?!? There is nothing wrong with being a fierce competitor and still being true to what I am…. I am very proud of being a woman in such a male dominated sport.

My friends laughed and really appreciated the name, and after launching my website (http://www.horsepowerandheels.com/) to the public, I received comments and notes from all across the world from other women who could relate. Its allowed me to meet so many great and supportive people.

I started the blog as an experiment in March of 2005 when I launched my website. I had just heard the word “blog” and wanted to learn more about the blogosphere and to have a place to talk about things that were important to me. It started off as a journal, keeping my family and friends informed with how the racing was going, but over the years has expanded to include all things important to me. I love the open communication it allows, and though my niche tends not to be as active in the social media area and don’t comment as much as I’d like, my blog still is the highest read section of my website, and brings 10,000 unique visitors and more each month.

I have readers of all types on Horsepower & Heels: men, women, other racers, and people who don’t race at all. Men thinks its cool, and love to chat cars. Women think its empowering, and kids like to see what’s possible when you put your mind to it. All of that is important. And I try to make sure that there is something for everyone, and that its easy to understand. I also think its important to use my blog for good causes too, that’s why you’ll see a lot of special causes posts (http://www.horsepowerandheels.com/blog/labels/Special%20Causes.html) in the mix too. Its important to give back.

After my rookie PRO season, my crewmate Debbie and I were laughing at all the funny things that happen behind the scenes getting to the races. Some of those stories just don’t make good blog posts, and some of them would have made me money on America’s Funniest Home Videos. So, we decided to start carrying around a camera for PNN.com and record what its like behind the scenes being to women on the road and at the races. So far, we’ve been struggling to get the car back together, but once the race season kicks back in for us, there’s sure to be hilarity to follow.

This goes back to what created Horsepower & Heels to begin with. People see you out there in racing t-shirts and tanks, and a firesuit, and they begin to forget that you’re still a woman and capable of being girlie and attractive. I haven’t been racing recently, and I still get the comments of awe and shock when I wear dresses and skirts, as if being a racer by default means I can’t be girlie too. Its not necessarily a bad thing, but sometimes it can get a little undermining… like, do people even see me as girl anymore? Am I really that transparent? I’ve been “just one of the guys” so long that sometimes I just want someone to open a car door for me, or comment on my new outfit, and not the size of my engine. Don’t get me wrong, I’m way more comfortable in a shop getting greasy than I am in the kitchen or garden, but still.

You always get the jerks who make rude and lude comments, that’s just part of it. But I think that as a whole, I’ve found men to be very respectful and complimentary of the actual talent of women athletes, a pretty face just is the very sweet icing on the cake. It breaks the stereotype that women who succeed in athletics are manly and ugly…. just look at Ashley Force or Danica Patrick. Beauty AND Brains AND talent to boot!

I do think that regular coverage of women sports is lacking. We are lucky in motorsports, because we’re the only sport that women and men compete together, so we already have media representatives there and grab their attention. But if it were an all-woman series, I don’t think we’d get the billing or the coverage at all, and that’s sad. Its the same for all the other sports…. womens’ basketball only is talked about when there’s a fight, etc.

I do think its very important to show support for our female athletes, and that especially includes corporate sponsorship. By allowing them the same means to achieve in their sport, you are not only giving them the chance to be the best, but you are lending credibility to them in the eyes of people who subconsciously or even consciously view them inferior.

I don’t neccesarily consider myself a feminist, but I’m all about empowering women to achieve anything they set out to do. I believe that by not conforming to this centuries old idea of what a woman is supposed to do, act, and be, we are redefining what we are. That includes sports….

Media coverage such as ….Because I Played Sports, more support from sponsors, more personalization into the lives of the women. How much more impressive is it to see these awesome athletes, and know that many of them are mothers, career women, etc. Most women athletes right now are not making their living from their sport, unlike male counterparts. That’s what makes their successes that much more impressive.

Special Thanks to Horsepower and Heels!

I’d like to extend a thank-you to Erica from Horsepower and Heels for including my blog in her Top 5 post for Blog Day 2008. It’s always an honor to be included in posts such as these.

Here’s what she had to say:

…Because I Played Sports
“Because I am really passionate about supporting women in sports of all kinds, this blog caught my eye for its coverage of women in all types of sports that are competing and kicking ass. Really great scope on women’s athletics, especially during this summer’s olympic games.”

I’ve added Horsepower and Heels to my blogroll because I support her position on competition and her professional career. Erica Ortiz is a dragcar racer who does an excellent job with her Horsepower & Heels brand and Web site. Her blog has the slogan, “Who says Horsepwer & Heels Don’t Mix?!? Back then they burned bras… now we BURN RUBBER!

Here’s what it says on her site:

“As a competitive and professional female in a predominantly male dominated sport, her story is appreciated well beyond the realms of hardcore race fans.  Because of her unique image, Erica’s reach and promotional abilities extend outside the racetrack.  From regular magazine coverage, prominent community membership & interaction on the web, radio, television, interviews and personal appearances are only a few of the benefits your company would be open to as a partner.   Erica is an outspoken individual in the racing industry, also contributing with occasional journalistic talent in several pen’d articles about the sport.   HorsepowerandHeels.com averages 300,000 hits and over 10,000 new visitors per month”

Keep up the great work, Erica, and best of luck with your company and racing!

Women’s Sports Magazines = Dying

Girls, seriously?

How about we put down the fashion magazines for just a second. We’re selling ourselves short in sports journalism, and if we don’t start coverage of our best moments on the athletic fields will disappear altogether.

I recently posted on how disappointed I was to learn that Sports Illustrated for Women was a flop. So, it was by coincidence that I came across the Sports Media and Society blog where author Marie Hardin posted that Golf for Women magazine has joined the ranks of womens sports magazines that have been discontinued.

But what she said about readership is particularly interesting.

“Golf for Women and Women’s Sports & Fitness both had respectable circulations — around 600,000, the same rate base as that of The Sporting News.“

Hardin concurs with the thoughts that I originally expressed in my previous post: advertising and identity are driving this trend of lack of material. Money and power reflect what’s important in our culture, and for some reason, our sports are not deemed an important enough to invest.

She linked to HerSports Magazine, which is interesting to me. I will be following the publication closely (particularly their new blog). But on the surface, I don’t see how they can draw the readers we need and deserve, because it’s not strong enough.

I think that we need to start getting opinionated about sports, sports coverage and sports news. I’m a firm believer that we as women can find the answer to the lack of sports journalism on the Web, where there’s unlimited space, and identity can be created and crafted as we choose. Should this work, we’ll prove that advertising is not necessary for the initial (and most important) stages of information share, and the news will literally go viral.

I think that if enough of us get together in the blogosphere and start talking sports, traditional media will follow, because advertisers would want to reach our audience. Anyone with me on this? Blogs are the perfect outlet for expressing our opinions.

Regardless, when someone finally hits this one home, it should really take off. Because, as Hardin says,

“Finding the formula that will attract the ad dollar has so far proven elusive for many women’s sports titles.