...Yeah screw boxing. (I give up. I just realized how little I know. Long read.)

[Rusty B]

I'm a dude, and average really (think, uh, Jim Carrey?). Had a couple of relationships and my share of wild nights in college. I liked all those girls a lot but some of them were very popular and I've had to fend off several "hot dudes", some of whom I've seen on TV since. So, I've probably been someone else's "ugly ***".

Dating is a numbers game: as long as he's got basic stuff in order (i.e. hygiene, I wonder what some people do in the morning), an average dude with lots of friends in a psychology faculty will have better odds than a hot dude whose social life amounts to one DnD night per week at Mark's place.

Regarding looks, I think that, once you are attractive enough that the girl says "ok I'd go to bed with this guy" then returns diminish. Going from "obese" to "okay" will improve your success tremendously cuz obesity is universally unattractive, but going from "okay" to "very fit" will not do as much, as you were probably already a "yes" for most girls you'll interact with. In reality, most of the "ugly ***" guys that are with attractive girls are actually okay-ish, they may even be tall, masculine or stylish when you look at them closer. A good example would be Adriana Lima dating Marko Jaric. Ok, she's an atomic bomb and he's got a funny face but the guy's damn tall, masculine and a successful pro athlete to boot, he'd be a "yes" in most women's books:

That's the big trend re looks IMO. Then, you've got other stuff going on like her personal preferences (based on real life examples: she only dates Arabs, she likes blond guys, she has a crush on a singer who vaguely looks like you, she loves Italian culture, she's big into heavy metal, etc.), money, status, etc.

I'd probably consider myself an average dude now (I'm 40), but that wasn't the case in my early 20's. I was up there, though not in a way that I think would matter in real life.

Think Leonardo DiCaprio, back in the late 90's - although I don't look like him in any way... BUT... a lot of women thought he was great to look at... he was attractive in a "pretty boy" sort of way; but didn't have that uber-masculine ruggedness to him.

That was me in my early 20's.

Did my looks get me laid at the time? No doubt.

But if I wanted anything more than that... then I had trouble.

Finding a woman who looked good enough to where she wouldn't have to worry about sharing the spotlight... not much luck.

When you go further down the looks hierarchy in women, the need for women to be the better looking partner decreases. At some point down the looks department, it's more socially advantageous for her to have the arm candy than to look better than her man. The women who straddled the line between the two... that's who I had the best luck with.

Around my mid-20's... I actually began gaining weight on purpose to put an end to that.