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Multi Gold-winning Paralympian Tanni Grey-Thompson explores the role of women in sport through history. In 2021, women’s sport is in the ascendancy. Women’s football is riding high after the 2019 World Cup, women’s snooker is reaching corners of the world it has never previously reached and darts is no longer a male preserve.

Meanwhile it is the 100th anniversary of the Women’s Olympiad – the first dedicated female sporting event in the world. Tanni looks at some of the milestones in sport for women over the decades and acknowledges several people who were pivotal in helping to make sure women were finally recognised – among them Alice Milliat, the French woman who organised that first international women’s sporting event in Monte Carlo in 1921.

Tanni reflects on some of those whose achievements really helped to change the course of history for women in sport – from athletes like Dale Greig, the first woman to run a marathon in under 3.5 hours, Russian Olgo Korbut who helped to change the perception of women in gymnastics, tennis player Althea Gibson, the first African-American to win a Grand Slam and the footballers who battled a five-decade ban on women playing on official grounds in England.
Tanni also assesses the contribution by women behind the scenes in sport.

(Photo: Tanni Grey-Thompson after finishing Fourth in the 200m T54 for Women at the 2004 Paralympic Games, Athens, Greece)