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As the World Snooker Championships continue in Sheffield, Jane meets two women who have each played ground breaking roles in the game. Reanne Evans has won ten consecutive World Ladies’ Snooker titles.  She recently secured a place as the only female competitor in the World Championships, where she played the former World Champion, Ken Doherty.  Michaela Tabb is the first woman to have refereed at a professional ranking snooker tournament and the first to officiate at the World Snooker Championship final.

We speak to Olympic Gold Medalist Joanna Rowsell ahead of the on Saturday 2 May. She’s riding in with Paralympic champion Dame Sarah Storey who’s set up a new women’s team with her husband Barney. She tells Jane about success after London 2012 and the Commonwealth Games and about preparations for Rio 2016.

As the Tour de Yorkshire gets underway, some Sheffield cyclists are just starting out with riding a bike. Women only cycling classes were introduced just over a year ago and have proved particularly popular with women from the Asian community. The scheme is a partnership between a community organisation, and  (part of Sheffield ) who encourage cycling throughout South Yorkshire.  So far, around 50 women have learnt to ride a bike and they speak of the importance of learning in a safe all-female environment and the sense of achievement and freedom which this new skill gives them. Angela Robson went along to a class in High Hazel Park in Sheffield where she met some of the women learning to cycle and their Pedal Ready trainer, Pam Walton.

The women who worked in Sheffield’s steel mills during the Second World War are to be honoured with a statue, which will be put up next year in the centre of the city.  The memorial is the culmination of a fund raising campaign which goes back to 2009.  The women were drafted into the factories to replace men who’d gone off to fight. They worked long hours in hard and dirty conditions – not even stopping when the air raid siren went off.  Jane is joined by two of the surviving ‘Women of Steel’ – Kathleen Roberts and Kit Sollitt - and by Nancy Fielder, who led the Sheffield Star’s campaign to have the women’s work commemorated.

They describe themselves as a veritable English folk super group and over the last two years, The Full English have brought historic British folk songs to audiences across the country. The band was formed to highlight the English Folk Dance and Song Society’s database of traditional music. Now they’re on a farewell tour and will be appearing in Sheffield on Sunday.  Jane is joined by singer, Fay Hield and guitarist, Martin Simpson – who’ll be telling us about the ways in which women are portrayed in folk songs and performing, The Bad Girl’s Lament.

The Full English tour begins in Bristol on Saturday, May 2nd