With the recent increase in women's masters classes, I am curious if there are plans to change the event weights. With the men, the 56lb heavy weights for distance and height are replaced by a 3 stone 42lb implement. Has any discussion occured regarding a 1.5 stone 21lb implement. Is this even an issue?

This was worked threw in a thread tittled " http://www.nasgaweb.com/forums/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=5693 - Weights for Older Throwers "  with some lively smack from and to Caber Catcher.  If you ignore that part, the thread has a good discussion of the issue of weights for Master throwers with good input from Malcolm Doying, Walley Olecik, and others.

Since there is no national standards board (thank goodness), there is  only logic and precedent.

I believe the following is a fair summary of what appeared to be agreement in this thread:

Womens (listed here for comparison sake):
LWFD:            14 lbs   1 Stones
HWFD & WOB:      28 lbs   2 Stones
Sheaf:            12 lbs Heavy & 10 lbs Light    
Hammers:         16 lbs Heavy & 12 lbs Light 

Women Masters: -- Not well defined
LWFD:            14 lbs   1.0 Stones
HWFD & WOB:      21 lbs   1.5 Stones
Sheaf:            10lbs ??? - not certain there was agreement but logic seems to work here
Hammers:         16 lbs Heavy & 12 lbs Light

Mens (listed here for comparison sake):
LWFD:            28 lbs   2 Stones
HWFD & WOB:      56 lbs   4 Stones
Sheaf:            20 lbs Heavy & 16 lbs Light    
Hammers:         22 lbs Heavy & 16 lbs Light 

Masters Mens:
LWFD:            28 lbs   2 Stones
HWFD & WOB:      42 lbs   3 Stones
Sheaf:            16 lbs
Hammers:         22 lbs Heavy & 16 lbs Light 

Senior Masters (60+) -- Not well defined
LWFD:            21 lbs   1.5 Stones
HWFD & WOB:      35 lbs   2.5 Stones
Sheaf:            16 lbs  - Could justify 12 lbs
Hammers:         22 lbs Heavy & 16 lbs Light 
                  16 lbs Heavy & 12 lbs Light - has been suggested.

There seems to be no desire to lighten the stones for the masters, nor am I advocating this.  Just a comment since the other implements are listed. 

I have often been accused of over thinking things .......

I cannot figure out how the 12lb Women Sheafs bag came about. I was once told that it came from either Mid-Atlantic of the Southeast region but I never really tried tracking it down.

The 12lb weight is not consistent with the weight throws in which women throw half the men's weight.  This most likely arises from how the men's heavy sheaf came about.

From my understanding, 16lbs was the standard sheaf weight for men until the flick came along and uprights where being topped.  This lead to the heavier 20 lbs sheaf bag. (am I correct?). 

If one uses the weight over bar weights as a pattern to determine the sheaf weights, it would seem logical that women's sheaf should weigh 8 lbs (half of the "traditional" men's sheaf).  A heavier sheaf bag of 10 lbs would then be introduced when women start topping the standards.   

OR

another way of looking at it is that women now throw half the weight as men.  Thus, the heavy bag for women should be half the weight of the Men's Heavy bag.  Thus, the 10 lbs Sheaf should be the heavy bag and the 8 lb sheaf should be the light bag.   

But it appears that the standards for Women's sheaf is a 12 lbs heavy bag and a 10 lbs light bag.

Of course all one has to do is to point out that the hammer weights do not follow the pattern of half the men's weights and chalk this up to someone who thinks to much (or not enough?).

FYI:
It has not been a popular thing amoung some girls to go backwards in the weights....We are used to throwing heavy. But the best persons to ask is the Ladies themselves! I would post the is question on the general board, and then see what is said.

Cheers

Little One

AKA Cherie Childs