Why There’s Still Stigma Around Periods in Sports, According to Athletes and Coaches

October 1, 2024

According to data collected as part of Adidas’s Stay in Play campaign, among the 14,000 athletes they surveyed, 65.3 percent had not received education on periods, and 75.8 percent had not discussed menstrual cycles with their coach. This matters for a number of reasons, not least of which is that, as research suggests, nearly one in four girls drops out of a sport during adolescence due to period-related concerns.

But if the menstrual cycle is a perfectly natural process in the body — one that can have an impact on training, no less — why the silence?

Athletes, coaches, exercise physiologists, and subject matter experts weigh in to help elucidate why period taboo persists in the sports world today, why it’s doing a major disservice to our female athletes, and where we can go from here. PopSugar