The American Grid Trials is an online competition and combine that does not separate per gender.  Of the last year’s 10  GRID Trials tests: 6 top scores where by females, 4 were by males, and 1 was a tie. There is opportunity for either to win within our tests.

Why do this?

In the sport of GRID, men and women are equally valued. Much like in football, where a 300lb lineman must do his job in order for the 160lb receiver to do his… men and women have different roles on the same team that are equally important.

In addition, there are often times when men and women go head to head in elements on the GRID. The outcome of these matchups are a large influence on the team’s success.

Part of the essence of the sport is bringing the genders together in competition by putting them on the same teams. There is no more gender segregation in GRID. They compete together as they do in school, in jobs, and in life.

We believe our testing should reflect this.

[common concern] What about the physical differences?

Think of it like weight classes in weight lifting or combat sports. We compensate for the average physical difference where necessary, just as we do in the elements on the GRID.

No one has done this in direct competition. It is not a refined process yet. The current compensations are taken from what we observe in past competition. As time goes on and we have more data to pull from, these adjustments will become more and more accurate.

[common concern] But the weight differences are different than CrossFit

While we do take some gender compensations directly from CrossFit, we do adjust the majority. We take this from our experience in what yields the most even results, on average, for our particular elements.

[common concern] This setup seems weird, I am not sure about it.

Like a new pair of shoes, it might take a minute to get used to. Our history has dictated that there be segregation between genders in sports so that feels normal and this is different. Change feels awkward at first. We believe that in the future, it will be more common for the genders to compete together. It’s just more beneficial, more rewarding and (most importantly) more entertaining.

Will we lose some competitors because this structure of competition is different? Yes. That said, we feel most of them will be guys that are afraid to lose to a female. We’re fine with that.