Experts in Sport: The future of women's sport

As the 2023 Women’s World Cup draws to a thrilling close, Loughborough University’s Experts in Sport podcasts concludes its ‘Women in Sport’ series with a look towards the future.

In this episode, Sue Anstiss (Loughborough University alumna and CEO of Fearless Women) sits down with host Martin Foster to discuss her research towards the growth of women’s sport.

Sue tackles the driving factors that have brought women’s sport to where it is today, reflecting on the exclusion and inequalities that have been a barrier for too long.

With this in mind, she details the necessary elements that would encourage the future growth of women’s sport, as well as how it could positively evolve in the next 10 years.

Sue has been driving change in sport for over 30 years. For 27 years she ran a multi award-winning sports PR agency which had a momentous impact on grassroots participation in the UK, raising profile of hundreds of organisations and brands including sports teams, NGBs, leisure operators, events and charities, all with the goal to get people healthy and active.

She dedicated resources to pro bono activity that supported charitable organisations in sport and fitness. Sue is now CEO of Fearless Women, and a passionate activist for equality in women’s sport.

A founding trustee of the Women’s Sport Trust and co-founder of the Women’s Sport Collective – a network for all women working in sport – in 2018 Sue received an MBE for her services to grassroots and women’s sport.

In 2019 she launched The Game Changers podcast, which celebrates and amplifies the stories of trailblazing women in sport.

Sue is also the director and producer of the Netflix documentary Game On. The Unstoppable Rise of Women’s Sport. Her book of the same name, published in 2021, was shortlisted for the Sunday Times Sports Book Awards and longlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year.

Listeners of the podcast can subscribe and download the latest episode by visiting iTunes, Spotify, and TuneIn. All subscribers will receive an alert once new episodes are published.

The Experts in Sport podcast is a regular series that brings together experts from across Loughborough University with external thought leaders to discuss the latest research and hot topics in sport and academia with new episodes launched regularly.

ENDS

Notes for editors

Press release reference number: 23/126

Loughborough is one of the country’s leading universities, with an international reputation for research that matters, excellence in teaching, strong links with industry, and unrivalled achievement in sport and its underpinning academic disciplines.

It has been awarded five stars in the independent QS Stars university rating scheme, named the best university in the world for sports-related subjects in the 2023 QS World University Rankings – the seventh year running – and University of the Year for Sport by The Times and Sunday Times University Guide 2022.

Loughborough is ranked 7th in The UK Complete University Guide 2023, 10th in the Guardian University League Table 2023 and 11th in the Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2023.
Loughborough is consistently ranked in the top twenty of UK universities in the Times Higher Education’s ‘table of tables’, and in the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021 over 90% of its research was rated as ‘world-leading’ or ‘internationally-excellent’. In recognition of its contribution to the sector, Loughborough has been awarded seven Queen's Anniversary Prizes.

The Loughborough University London campus is based on the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and offers postgraduate and executive-level education, as well as research and enterprise opportunities. It is home to influential thought leaders, pioneering researchers and creative innovators who provide students with the highest quality of teaching and the very latest in modern thinking.

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