Max power ability in males versus females

Hi, I am currently supervising the training of collegiate division 1 men’s and women’s tennis teams and have been wondering about the power ability differences between the players.
Are women able to put out the same percentage of their max power in a single effort as men? Knowing that men will have a higher total capacity, is the ratio between the max power output vs. upper limit the same in men as women or are men able to put out a higher percentage of their max, upper limit, power?

Hopefully I am phrasing this question correctly, for me this would apply to how I coordinate their medball/plyos/sprints between the men’s and women’s teams.

Thanks for the help.

I would think that, relative to weights prep, the power output of MB and plyos would be somewhat self regulating. that said, there is the issue of overall exposure to this training means. Thoughts?

I am thinking in terms of general physical ability between men and women in this case. In this case we can consider that the group of men and women have equal backgrounds in the medball/plyos etc, and theoretically are going to be putting out their max power per exercise.
In this case would one have to take into consideration that men are putting out more power than women and need longer rest breaks/lower reps? Or, is the amount of power they are putting out per exercise equal (all else being equal between the two groups).

I just want to be sure that by applying the same reps/recovery to the men and women will not result in the men not fully recovering, etc, and the women maybe not getting enough reps… (knowing there will be slight differences on an individual basis).

I think you’re on the right track with your analysis of the situation but there’s no direct formula because of the individual differences

I think you may find, women generally will do whatever you tell them, no matter how much they are hurting, or how much they are slowing! Whereas men generally will voice up more often.
Saying that, you get the odd female who all they do is winge and complain about every damn thing possible…

Right now I just have the problem that the women don’t seem to understand 100% when it comes to these medball throws. While the guys are grunting and yelling the ladies are barely getting off their toes.
I think for this week of maintenance I am going to maintain the women’s volumes of medball throws (3x5) and drop the men’s (3x3), trying to preserve some freshness for this coming weekend’s matches. Hope to see good results!

ahrr, im with you! I have seen the exact same thing too. Its a confidence thing with the females - they freak out when throwing the ball and diving. Guys dont give a rats, they love it.
Have u got access to high jump mats for the girls? get their confidence up by getting them to dive onto them

That explains why a jackrabbit is faster than a horse.

If biomechanically a bumble bee can’t fly is the model being used flawed.

It was at a speed dynamics clinic (Macquarie Shores) hosted by Lauren Seagrade and he explained how a horses back leg was used for the modelling.

On CF I read “no direct formula because of the individual differences”

using the Pluto theory it’s got to be worth another reddie

Off topic but what does this mean??

Yes it is off topic, I got a big STFU and a red square to replace the green one. Pluto is not a planet and using that theory I guess i was exploring something different. I was told if I wanted to pass a coaching exam to move to NZ.

In another post I asked if PT was involved with bolts training, if he is I still have the papers he got it from.

If I may add a further perspective on the differences between Men and Women, an EMS study* pointed out that:
higher sensory and supramotor excitability to surface electrostimulation in female subjects provide further evidence for a neurophysiological explanation for more pronounced pain perception in women.

Note*:
Differences in Electrical Stimulation Thresholds between Men and Women; Maffiuletti et al.; Annals of Neurology, Apr.2008.

That 40 year old triathlete ran her best ever triathlon result a couple of days after a miny run
she is a physio therapist that works for a hospital researching into parkinson disease. She wore a thing for testing electrical impulses strapped to her leg for a session, she had it on for the whole day. I am to get the results next training session. Next comp is 10k at the world masters.

Don’t know what this has to do with the post, but it’s what went through my head when I read this.

What 40-year-old triathlete are you referring to? In the study you re-quoted, the subjects were 40 healthy volunteers (20 men, 20 women). The researchers work respectively at a Neuromuscular Research Laboratory, at the Health Sciences department of a University, and at a National Institute of Health in different countries.

Susan Murray, came 14th in her age bracket, it was about 4 weeks back, she turn up to training with a black box strapped to her leg, I asked the question, she was wearing it for work, the patients were expected to wear one for a day and as part of the staff she was wearing one too. Wear it while training with me I look at the data relating to my session…

I will ask if possible to have her and magic (23 year old male) wear one at one of the my high CNS sessions to see if they can measure the differences betweer male and female. I will post if it goes ahead.

I was a bush kid with dogs,Year 12 Warren central High school 1974, I remember one day bringing a pig to school and experimented with different electrical current / muscles.
I failed english topped science, does that make me a dumb kid or what.

In another note to this;

The women seem to learn the medball throws more quickly than the men and show improvement in them. I have noticed that the women are becoming more efficient in using their legs while many of the men are still trying to use their arms.

Might be just a confidence thing, the women might be less worried about throwing “hard” and more concerned with throwing “well”…

Any physiological reasoning for this? or purely psychological…?

Could be because, as some studies show, women’s upper body strength relative to bodyweight is only about 60-65% to that of men’s strength. However, they have around 90-100% of the lower body strength as men-again, relative to bodyweight.

So the women simply don’t have the upper body strength to muscle up the med balls and must resort to using their lower bodies more completely.

So does this have implications for the quantities or types of exercises you give to women/men?

Maybe in order to accomodate for this you would have the men fatigue their upper body before having them do medball throws, thus creating a need for them to use their legs.

This also addresses the ratio of upper body/lower body strength. Do men need percentages more like women, where their squats far exceed their bench?

It could but I don’t think I would compromise the ordering to try to limit a possibly preferrred (even if subconsciously) muscle group from taking over when fatigue would be a state to avoid especially where high power outputs are sought.

I’ve never felt, personally, that the training of the two genders should be very, if at all, different.

Why not strengthening women’s upper body first (e.g., shoulders) instead of tiring that of men’s? You can’t ‘mess up’ with nature; these differences exist anyway and can be reduced up to a point but never be eliminated. I agree with Pioneer’s posts.