On one of the cycling forums I frequent there is an incredibly lengthy thread where members post up pictures of girls in lycra.  It currently runs to a few hundred pages so you can imagine there are lots of pages in there.  Whilst many will argue this is harmless fun there is a sense that female athletes still get considerably more recognition if they happen to be photogenic.  In the cycling world for instance Victoria Pendleton is relatively famous, one senses as much for her good looks as her cycling ability, whereas someone like Nicole Cooke, a fellow Beijing gold medalist, is not as well known because she isn't as photogenic.  One could say the same about an athlete like Jessica Ennis.

Of course the objectification of women is far from a new thing and there is much said about the merits or otherwise of having very thin models appearing in magazines.  Many will argue that having female athletes doing well is a great thing for young girls, but how about when those same athletes are portrayed in sexy poses?  Does their athletic prowess outweigh their need to sexualise themselves?

New research wanted to test this theory out by seeing how women and girls feel when they see female athletes in such poses.  Participants were split into three groups.  The first group looked at images of female athletes in a sporting context.  The second group looked at female athletes with lots of flesh on display.  The third group looked at bikini clad magazine models.

After looking at the photos they were then asked to write a paragraph describing both the women in the photos and how it made them feel to see the photo.

The interesting thing is that when they looked at the sexy photos they revealed that they admired the physiques of the athletes and commented on their sexiness, with a corresponding negative opinion of their own bodies, whilst also finding the images inappropriate.

The people that looked at the bikini models responded in a similar way, although they didn't feel the photos were inappropriate, almost like they'd come to expect such photos from people they didn't know had other talents.

However when they viewed women in sporting action they tended to relate the photos to admiration of their determination, passion and commitment.  They wrote about feeling inspired to play sport and reflected more on their own sporting achievements than on their perceived sexuality.

"Infusing more performance images of female athletes into the media may be helpful in promoting physical activity among girls and young women," the researchers said. "Currently, female athletes are largely absent from magazines targeted at teen girls."

So the message appears to be that if you want to inspire young women to follow your path into sport you should keep your kit very much on.