[4bpp]

Taking a step back, I think "search for outliers" doesn't quite get to the heart of the issue. Why are we searching for the outliers, and why are we so particular about the base distributions that we are searching for outliers of - why are there women's sports at all (if the outliers they find are not outliers on the same metric in the whole population), and why is boxing, for example, divided into weight classes?

It seems to me that a big part of the point of competitive spectator sports is to send, to the spectator, a message along the lines of "this could have been you". It is hard to argue that the ability to throw a 1kg+ discus exceptionally far is otherwise so useful that would justify all the expense of finding and showcasing the outlier. Therefore, the point of the competition stands and falls with whether the spectator buys this message.

When do spectators tend to believe in it? When should they? Arguably, there is a plethora of reasons why the median American spectator looking at a clip of Usain Bolt running could not in any meaningful sense have been him. Yet, somehow, the "could-have-been-me sense" that people are endowed with transcends these reasons and results in men commonly looking at him and getting some of that could-have-been-me sense that gives the sport meaning, and women looking at him and getting much less of it. To solve this, we maintain a separate women's category. The winner there is not as much of an outlier relative to the distribution of the whole population. Most likely, she is still every bit as dissimilar to the spectators as Usain Bolt is. Yet, the women watching, and the ones merely learning about this event happening through osmosis, get their heart warmed by the dubious sense that this could have been them, and perhaps encouraged to try harder and hold more hope for some other pursuit of their own, in a way that they never would have due to Usain Bolt. Would they or would they not get the feeling for a transwoman sprinter? How would we even measure this?

[PepperdineG]

>why is boxing, for example, divided into weight classes?

A combination of boxer safety and having more competitive matches.

[dspillett]

> and why is boxing, for example, divided into weight classes?

Entertainment value. Put a flyweight against a heavyweight and the audience are not going to care. No audience means no money for the show runners, and the Olympics is, when you get down to the brass tacks, all about money.