
The macho sperm myth - kawera
https://aeon.co/essays/the-idea-that-sperm-race-to-the-egg-is-just-another-macho-myth
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Footkerchief
The author seems confused:

> Sperm passage up the female tract is more like an extremely challenging
> military obstacle course than a standard sprint-style swimming race. Sperm
> numbers are progressively whittled down as they migrate up the female tract,
> so that less than one in a million from the original ejaculate will surround
> the egg at the time of fertilisation. Any sperm with physical abnormalities
> are progressively eliminated along the way, but survivors surrounding the
> egg are a random sample of intact sperm.

> The entrenched idea that ‘the best sperm wins’ has elicited various
> suggestions that some kind of selection occurs, but it is difficult to
> imagine how this could possibly happen. The DNA in a sperm head is tightly
> bound and virtually crystalline, so how could its properties be detected
> from outside?

