For years women have been excluded from exercise research on the assumption that menstrual cycles affect results. A recent BYU study published in the Journal of Applied Physiology shows that women’s performance in aerobic exercise was the same regardless of cycle phase. (More research is needed for women with menstrual disorders.) “[In the past it was assumed] that women are like men, just smaller,” says exercise-science professor Jayson R. Gifford (BS ’09, MS ’11), but this study revealed big differences between women’s and men’s exercise.
