Menstrual Cycle Tracking in Women’s Sport: From Awareness to Better Athlete Support

Women’s sport has experienced major growth in recent years. A clear example is the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics, which will be the most gender-balanced Olympic Winter Games in history, with 47% of athlete quota places allocated to women (International Olympic Committee, 2025).

With this growing visibility and professionalisation, topics that were once treated as private are now becoming part of performance conversations — one of these topics is the menstrual cycle. Menstrual cycle tracking is increasingly recognised as one of the central components of female athlete monitoring. Tracking the cycle is important for numerous reasons, including increasing athlete awareness of hormonal fluctuations, supporting interpretation of daily symptoms and readiness, and enabling coaches to better understand how individual athletes respond across different phases of their cycle. (Carmichael et al., 2025; Verhagen et al., 2025). However, the goal should not be to make broad assumptions such as “athletes perform worse in one phase.” Current evidence suggests that responses are highly individual and that symptoms may be more meaningful than cycle phase alone (McNulty et al., 2020).

Why menstrual cycle tracking matters in female sport

The menstrual cycle can be linked to symptoms such as cramps, fatigue, mood changes, sleep disruption and changes in energy levels. For some athletes, these symptoms may have little impact. For others, they may affect training quality, recovery or availability.

Recent research supports this individual approach. In professional volleyball players, menstrual symptoms were frequently reported across the season, with cramps, disturbed sleep and fatigue among the most common symptoms (Roffler et al., 2024). In elite Football players, the number of menstrual-cycle symptoms was associated with sleep characteristics, suggesting that symptoms themselves can provide important context for athlete wellbeing (Halson et al., 2024).

A practical tracking approach does not need to be overly complicated. Its value lies in connecting simple, repeated data points into a more meaningful understanding of how an athlete responds over time.

When viewed in isolation, individual elements such as cycle length (typically ranging between ~1–28 days depending on the athlete), menstruation dates (start and end of the bleeding phase), or symptom reports may appear fragmented. However, when these inputs are considered together, they begin to form a clearer picture of recurring patterns in physiology, wellbeing, and training readiness.

For most teams, useful information may include:

• Cycle length (typically 21–35 days in eumenorrheic athletes, with deviations outside this range often indicating irregularity)

• Start and end of menstruation (bleeding phase dates)

• Symptom type

• Symptom intensity

• Changes in physical and psychological readiness over time

• Whether symptoms influence training availability or performance capacity

Tracking should never be treated as a medical diagnostic tool unless supported by qualified professionals.

Illustrated representation of the menstrual cycle phases with athletes in action, highlighting the menstrual phase (Days 1-5), follicular phase (Days 6-14), ovulatory phase (Days 15-17), and luteal phase (Days 18-28).

Why women’s football still needs more research

Although interest in menstrual cycle tracking is growing, research in women’s Football is still limited. The UEFA consensus statement highlights that menstrual cycle tracking is increasingly recognised as important, but its use in football remains inconsistent and under-researched (Verhagen et al., 2025).

Some studies suggest possible associations between menstrual cycle phase and injury risk in female footballers, but the evidence is not strong enough to create universal rules (Barlow et al., 2024). This means clubs should be careful with how they interpret cycle data. The menstrual cycle should be seen as one layer of context, not as the only explanation for performance, fatigue or injury risk.

The menstrual cycle in context with PULSE

At PULSE Sport, menstrual cycle tracking fits into a broader athlete monitoring approach. The cycle is combined with other key metrics across physical, physiological, lifestyle, and psychological domains to provide a more complete understanding of athlete readiness and response. This enables teams to understand patterns that are specific to each athlete rather than relying on general assumptions.

For example, an athlete may begin to display recurring internal signals that seem to follow a subtle rhythm across time. When these signals are first observed, they may appear isolated or context-dependent; however, their meaning becomes clearer when they consistently align with broader changes in an athlete’s overall state.

This becomes more meaningful if it consistently appears together with lower recovery or higher training load. Over time, this helps staff and athletes anticipate needs and adapt training, recovery, or support strategies more accurately.

Key Takeaway: The menstrual cycle is not a standalone performance metric. It is part of the bigger picture.

Conclusion

Menstrual cycle tracking is no longer a peripheral consideration in women’s sport, it is becoming an essential layer in understanding the female athlete. The real challenge is not the collection of data, but the ability to transform it into something meaningful, contextual, and actionable.

With PULSE Sport, teams can connect menstrual cycle information with broader athlete monitoring signals to uncover patterns that would otherwise remain hidden in isolation. What emerges is not just data, but clarity, a structured understanding of how athletes respond, adapt, and fluctuate over time.

By combining context, personalised tracking, and integrated monitoring, PULSE provides the clearest path from awareness to action, helping athletes perform at their best while staying healthy.

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References

Barlow, A., Blodgett, J. M., Williams, S., Pedlar, C. R., & Bruinvels, G. (2024). Injury incidence, severity, and type across the menstrual cycle in female footballers: A prospective three season cohort study. Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, 56(6), 1151–1158. https://doi.org/10.1249/MSS.0000000000003391

Carmichael, M. A., Perry, K., Roberts, A. H., Klass, V., & Clarke, A. C. (2025). Menstrual cycle monitoring in applied sport settings: A scoping review. International Journal of Sports Science & Coaching, 20(5), 2268–2285. https://doi.org/10.1177/17479541251333888

Halson, S. L., Johnston, R. D., Pearson, M., Minahan, C., & Fowler, P. M. (2024). Menstrual-cycle symptoms and sleep characteristics in elite soccer players. International Journal of Sports Physiology and Performance, 19(9), 914–920. https://doi.org/10.1123/ijspp.2023-0049

International Olympic Committee. (2025). Milano Cortina 2026 set to be a landmark Olympic Winter Games for gender equality. Olympics.com.

McNulty, K. L., Elliott-Sale, K. J., Dolan, E., Swinton, P. A., Ansdell, P., Goodall, S., Thomas, K., & Hicks, K. M. (2020). The effects of menstrual cycle phase on exercise performance in eumenorrheic women: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Sports Medicine, 50(10), 1813–1827. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40279-020-01319-3

Roffler, A., Fleddermann, M.-T., de Haan, H., Ferrauti, A., Kellmann, M., & Jakowski, S. (2024). Menstrual cycle tracking in professional volleyball athletes. Frontiers in Sports and Active Living, 6, 1408711. https://doi.org/10.3389/fspor.2024.1408711

Verhagen, E., Ferrer, E., da Silva Antero, J., Bahtijarevic, Z., Barlow, A., Bolling, C., Gabarro, M., Harrison, M., Jarrin, P., Janse de Jonge, X., Paternotte, E., Tomás, R., Jimenez, C., Keay, N., Lewin, G., van den Steen, E., & Elliott-Sale, K. (2025). UEFA consensus statement on menstrual cycle tracking in women’s football. BMJ Open Sport & Exercise Medicine, 11, e002769. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjsem-2025-002769

Casto, K. V. (2022). Tracking women’s reproductive data in sport: Practical limitations, perils and pitfalls. Sports Medicine, 52, 1723–1727. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40279-022-01665-6

Howe, O. R. (2024). Ethical risks of systematic menstrual tracking in sport. Journal of Bioethical Inquiry, 21, 543–557. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11673-024-10394-8