Her lobbying on behalf of female athletes led to the accelerated inclusion of more women's events in the Olympic Games.

A member of Fémina Sport, a club founded in 1911, Milliat helped form the Fédération Française Sportive Féminine in 1917, becoming treasurer and, in March 1919, its president.

[3][4] After her husband's death, she travelled widely, developing language skills that enabled her to become a translator when, following the outbreak of the First World War, she returned to France.

[7] A member of Fémina Sport, a club founded in 1911, Milliat helped form the Fédération Française Sportive Féminine in 1917, becoming treasurer and, in March 1919, its president.

From the early 1920s, she was a writer for French magazines including Le Soldat de Demain and L'Auto, and promoted football for women in articles.

[1][9] In August 1922, the Jeux Olympiques Féminins (also known as the 1922 Women's World Games), regarded as the first Women's Olympics took place in Pershing Stadium in Paris and featured five teams, representing including the United States, Great Britain, Switzerland, Czechoslovakia and host country France.

[1][5] When Henri de Baillet-Latour succeeded Coubertin as head of the IOC, the intention was to hold the next event in his home country, but the Belgian organisers withdrew their participation.

[10] Due to pressure from the FSFI, the IOC eventually integrated five women's track and field events into the Olympics in 1928.

After these games, Milliat issued an ultimatum: fully integrate the 1936 Olympics, or cede all women's participation to the FSFI.

[4][7] Although the FSFI had staged events with an increasing number of participants, and expanded its membership from the initial five nations to at the 1922 Games to thirty countries in 1936, it never met again after the decision about the 1936 Olympics,[5] and Milliat's engagement with women's sport ended.

[16] Mary Leigh and Thérèse M. Bonnin concluded in 1977 that without Milliat and the FSFI's efforts, track and field events at the Olympics would only have been opened to women much later.