From 396 BC to today, a history of women’s sport through the 40 athletes that changed everything…

This book evokes, with forty portraits of sportswomen, the way in which women have gradually succeeded in investing in a field historically and universally considered to be reserved for men: sport.

These portraits allow us to address the history of women’s sport (through numerous disciplines: track & field, tennis, football, mountaineering, wrestling, cycling, sailing, etc.), but also the major issues, obstacles and difficulties that the pioneers of sport have been able to encounter and still encounter: reluctance from the medical profession and society, sexism, racism or homophobia in the sporting environment, sexual violence, control of women’s bodies through clothing or femininity tests, inequalities of means, difficulties access to motherhood…

This is the history of women’s sport, from Antiquity to the present day, which this book invites you to take in’.

Ève Menu holds a master’s degree in history and works in the field of communication.