• Question: Why are giirls more flexible but boys tend to be stronger?

    Asked by reess09 to Helen, Jenni, Mark, Martin, Stu on 23 Jun 2011. This question was also asked by meg53.
    • Photo: Jenni Tilley

      Jenni Tilley answered on 14 Jun 2011:

      Strength requires short, fat powerful muscles, while flexibility needs long, lean muscles. It also helps if you have stretchy tendons and ligaments. You can always increase your strength or flexibility by training your muscles in the appropriate way. Can’t really affect the stretchiness of your tendons though, just how strong they are.

    • Photo: Martin Lindley

      Martin Lindley answered on 15 Jun 2011:

      i am sure male gymnasts would suggest they are quite flexible 🙂 and quite strong as well ! so too would male ballet dancers !

      However esentially you are correct boys are stronger and girls are more flexible.

      This is partly down to the environmental factors, that is the activities we do (boys tend to do more strength stuff) and partly down to the hormones in our bodies that dictate how we grow. Boys have more testosterone in their systems than girls and so grow more muscle mass than girls, while girls have more female sex hormomes which can enhance flexibility of the ligaments and tendons.

      However training can quickly overcome these differences and you can get strong girls and flexible boys !

    • Photo: Helen O'Connor

      Helen O'Connor answered on 23 Jun 2011:

      i can’t add more to that really! Great answers Jenni and Martin. Our hormones do help our bodies develop in certain ways, but we can pretty much all train our bodies to be stronger or more flexible with practice.

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