Finally: Feisty Females Get a Dedicated Conference

Live Feisty Media will be hosting the Feisty Womxn’s Performance Summit Friday March 26 – Sunday March 28, 2021.

By: Christine Frietchen

“It’s a wild west at the moment. Everyone is jumping on the “woman thing” bandwagon and it can be unclear who really knows their stuff, and who is just taking advantage of a trend; who simply sees new potential for customers, and who just “shrinks it and pinks it” when it comes to their product lines.”

– Dr. Sara Gross, two-time Ironman champion and co-founder of Live Feisty Media

Enter the Feisty Womxn’s Performance Summit, with a full (virtual) weekend of real information, vetted insights, general rabble-rousing, and a call-to-arms for womxn in endurance sports, along with scientists, companies, coaches, platforms, and events that champion womxn in endurance sports. 

In recent years, womxn-in-sport advocates have escalated challenges to clinical and endurance studies that treat female athletes as an afterthought, or worse – ignore them completely. 

“Women get inaccurate, trickle-down, BS science and coaching information because traditionally male researchers have deemed us “messy” as study subjects – we have periods, we get pregnant, our hormones make us unreliable and unpredictable,” comments Selene Yeager, co-author of the bestselling book ROAR and host of the Hit Play Not Pause podcast from Live Feisty Media. The result? Womxn have largely been left on their own to figure it out, struggling to find training and nutrition strategies—strategies authored mainly for men–that might or might not work for their needs and performance.

According to Dr. Stacy Sims, applied researcher and co-author of “ROAR,” the bestselling book on female training and performance, “Inherently there are training programs that will maximize the potential for men, but when we apply it to women, it doesn’t do the same thing.” Female athletes have long known this anecdotally, but research efforts are now beginning to catch up. The Performance Summit will highlight new approaches, new science, and female specific performance data that’s at the forefront of the growing rally cry for better information. 

At the same time, the female experience in endurance sports isn’t all physiology. Mental health, nutrition, cultural differences, and the everyday challenges of balancing training, work, and family all play a part, and will be key parts of the Summit.

Womxn Experts at the Forefront

Summit attendees can look forward to hearing from, and interacting with, the leading experts in womxn’s performance. The full speaker roster will be revealed on February 22, but confirmed key speakers include:

•  Dr. Stacy Sims, exercise physiologist and female athlete performance specialist. Co-author of the groundbreaking book ROAR: How to Match Your Food and Fitness to Your Unique Female Physiology for Optimum Performance, Great Health, and a Strong, Lean Body for Life

• Mirna Valerio, inspirational speaker, cross-country coach, ultrarunner, and author of the memoir, A Beautiful Work in Progress 
  
• Erin Carson, co-owner of RallySport, a Boulder, Colorado training facility and health club, and head coach for ECFIT, strength training programs for endurance athletes
  
• Dr. Sara Gross, two-time Ironman champion, co-founder of Live Feisty Media, and host of the If We Were Riding podcast
  
• Selene Yeager, co-author of ROAR with Dr. Stacy Sims and host of the groundbreaking Hit Play Not Pause podcast focusing on menopausal athletes

Expect to hear from these and more experts in the fields of female mental health, nutrition, psychology, history and training – with sessions focused on youth athletes to menopausal athletes and everyone in between.

According to conference director Kathryn Taylor, “We are pulling together a group of experts on all of these areas who have trusted performance information we can rely on.”

Why “Womxn”?

The spelling may be unfamiliar to some, but it has a powerful meaning for Live Feisty Media. “We are drawing a line in the sand,” says Dr. Gross. Womxn (pronounced simply ‘women’ or ‘wo-mex’) anyone who identifies as female. “For as many people as identify as womxn, that’s how many ways there are to be a womxn in this world,” continues Dr. Gross. 

While not every discussion or session will be of interest or applicable to every participant, the Summit aims to embody the whole of inclusivity and female representation. 

Virtual in Circumstance, Not in Spirit

While the coronavirus pandemic has forced most traditional conferences and summits online, the Feisty Womxn’s Performance Summit won’t feel like just another Zoom meeting. The unique platform includes one-on-one and small-group interaction, snap surveys, live Q&A, multimedia, and more. And since this is a summit by and for endurance athletes, organizers don’t want anyone sitting in front of a screen too long. Expect breaks, exercise sessions, and challenges to get you on your feet and out of your chair.

A unique by-product of the COVID-19 pandemic has been a groundswell of community development and information-sharing. While racing and events have been curtailed, we have entered a period of transition and change. Live Feisty Media has been at the forefront, with a robust and enriching slate of top podcasts and both private and public online communities, including “If We Were Riding” and “IronWomen” for triathletes, “Girls Gone Gravel” for off-road cyclists, “Hit Play Not Pause” for peri- and menopausal athletes, “Mental Endurance” which helps athletes train their minds in sync with their bodies, and the boundary-pushing “[un]phased,” taking on social, cultural, inclusivity and diversity issues of critical importance to the health and growth of womxn’s sports.

Registration is Open!

Registration for the Feisty Womxn’s Performance Summit is open now and can be found HERE. Attendees get full access to all live workshops, keynotes, breakout sessions, roundtables, networking breaks, and fireside chats, along with a virtual swag bag, special activities, workouts and challenges, and a private online community opening soon for all participants. 

The Live Feisty team would never want you to miss a workout, so attendees can explore all recorded sessions at their leisure. 

This is one weekend that simply cannot be missed if you’re a female athlete, along with coaches, race directors, brands, and companies that want to engage with womxn on a deep and meaningful level, focused on maximizing female performance not only in sport, but through the entire trajectories of our lives.