Racers’ attractive looks, popularity, and performance: how do speedboat racers react to fans’ expectations?

Using a large sample of individual-level records in Japan speedboat racing where men and women racers participate, we investigated how racers’ performance meets fans’ pre-race expectations. To control for endogeneity bias, we measured the order of racers’ attractiveness randomly determined in each race and then used this order as instrument for measuring racers’ popularity. The fixed-effects IV estimations revealed the following. (1) Racers who are more attractive than their competitors tend to be more popular even after controlling for the condition of the race, racer ability, and other characteristics. (2) More popular men show better performance in the race even if the reward does not vary according to popularity; such tendency is not observed for women. This study contributes a novel setting for determining the expectation-enhancing effects of physical attractiveness.