Research 'gaps' about periods, the pill and female physiology affecting women in sport

Chinese swimmer Fu Yuanhui made headlines in 2016 at the Rio Olympics for telling a reporter she had not performed well due to the timing of her period.

While her comments showed discussing a woman's menstrual cycle in sport was still taboo, it also highlighted a research gap.

Sport and exercise scientist Brianna Larsen said most sports research is based on the physiology of men.

«Female research can be a little bit complicated, we have this thing called the menstrual cycle,» Dr Larsen, from the University of Southern Queensland, said.

And on top of that, she said there's not yet an understanding of the impact of hormonal contraceptives on physical performance. 

«We have all these different, invariable hormone profiles that men don't really have to worry about so in that way, men are easier to study.

»That also means there are some pretty big gaps in the data, meaning a lot of our sport science data that's underpinning practice is really based on the physiology of men." 

When exercise scientist Kurt Vogel started working with female athletes about seven years ago, he started by implementing period tracking and initiating conversations with players.

«That's when I started looking into the research, I realised it's not just the lack of research but the inconsistencies in methodology in the research, that means you can't actually rely on most of the papers around,» Mr Vogel said. 

«We don't actually know enough about female physiology and how it affects performance.»

He said a lot of the evidence relied on in female sport, was based on male research which could affect risk of injury, recovery times and overall performance. 

Mr Vogel is conducting his own research with female athletes at Lions FC.

Three times a week, he tests their