Wo bist der wahine?

Well...there's lots over there, of course.

But I was thinking more of here, in NYC, this Sunday, in the Mayor's Cup.

I'm volunteering this year, and it's a pretty awesome field, I may even go get a new camera in honor of the event (I've been playing with the idea of upgrading anyways), and I'm looking forward to everything except getting my non-morning-person self into Manhattan by 5 am.

But I just found out that although the mens' field is spectacular (particularly notable - Team Holland & Team USA slugging it out in honor of the Henry Hudson Quadricentennial) -

Of a field of 135 racers -

3 are women, and none of them are coming from a distance that can't be measured in city blocks. They're all good paddlers, but I guess I'm a little bummed out to find out how little pull this race seems to have for women racers.

Remember my September post, You Go, Alex? I didn't go into a lot of depth there, and I expect that post probably didn't make a lot of sense to anyone who wasn't familiar with surfski racing - but it's been a pet peeve of mine for a while that an awful lot of coverage of kayak racing really sort of doesn't mention women, even though there just have to be some good female racers out there.

So it was just really neat to see an Alexandra in there among the usual boyz.

I guess this time I won't complain too much when there isn't a lot of coverage of the women, knowing that all of 2% of the field is female -- although hint hint hint to any journalist stumbling across this, hmmm wouldn't that be an interesting take on the Mayor's Cup, what it's like to be one of 3 local women competing in a field of international elite men?

Still, I am a little bummed out to find out that I'm not going to get to see an Alex, or a Nikki Mocke (US surfski champion), or our own noted local speedsters Elizabeth O'Connor or Stefani Jackenthal in action. Would be fun, too, if a couple of the racers whose blogs I sometimes follow, like Sandy Bottom, a Purple Mirage, found this to be something for which they'd like to turn out - always fun seeing your home waters as seen through someone else's eyes.

Ah well. It's still a young race. Maybe down the road.