Women in Sailing Races: A Specific Professional Socialization

The purpose of this paper is to analyze how men and women become professional offshore racers. This is not a linear and continuous process, and as far as women are concerned, this stage in their professional career shows gender differences. Almost systematically they are kept in the background at the very beginning of their career as technicians and/or crew members. Therefore they have no other option but to begin as skippers in single-handed ocean racing.