First modification:
Lia Thomas competed in the men’s section until two years ago, then excluded herself for more than a year to undergo hormone suppression treatments. Her debut as a woman was accompanied by university records and the best 200-yard freestyle record of the year and brought with it the resignation of an official from USA Swimming, equivalent to the American federation.
Australian Ariarne Titmus won the 400m freestyle at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics in a time of 3: 56.69 minutes, 67 hundredths ahead of her closest competitor, defending champion Katie Ledecky.
When Lia Thomas of the University of Pennsylvania gained a similar distance, the 500 free yards at the Zippy Invitational on December 3, her 4: 34.06 win included a 14-second lead over her guard, her teammate Anna. Sofia Kalandaze. At 1,650 yards, that difference widened to 38 seconds.
That’s how dominant was the emergence of the Texas-born swimmer, who competed until two years ago in the men’s section as Will Thomas, and underwent a one-year gender transition, which includes administration of hormone suppressants, in order to participate. in the women’s championship.
Big brands during their participation in men’s competitions
As a man, Thomas had achieved the runner-up in the Ivy League two years ago with considerably better records: 1 seconds 69 hundredths less in 200 yards, 16 seconds behind in 500 and 1 minute and 5 seconds less in 1,650 yards.
But the margin of apparent deterioration has not been enough to convince those who doubt that his admission among women is fair. US Swimming official (equivalent to the American swimming federation) Cynthia Millen resigned after a career of more than 30 years as a judge.
“I told my fellow officials that I can no longer participate in a sport that allows biological men to compete against women. Everything fair about swimming is being destroyed,” Millen said in his resignation letter.
“The fact is that swimming is a sport in which bodies compete against bodies. Identities do not compete against identities,” the former officer added in an interview on the Tucker Carlson Tonight program. “What women are told is that they don’t matter, what they do is not important. We are throwing the girls onto the wheels of the bus with this,” he said.
“Boys will always have bigger lung capacity, bigger hearts, better circulation, a bigger skeleton and less fat,” Millen added.
The physical benefits that remain after the treatments
Millen’s assessment coincides with the experts who censored the admission of the transgender weightlifter Laurel Hubbard to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, where she presented herself as the recent runner-up in the world in the category of more than 87 kgs, but finished without valid lifts, affected because of the pressure around their participation.
In Hubbard’s case, specialists pointed out that athletes who have passed male puberty retain a competitive advantage that even hormonal treatments cannot regulate. A study revealed that in weights that advantage was 30% (of men compared to women). A full year of testosterone suppression only lowered that margin by 5%.
However, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) only demanded one requirement at that time to participate in the women’s section: a maximum of 10 nanograms of testosterone per milliliter of blood.
The National College Athletic Association (NCAA) authorized Thomas to participate as a woman, once he underwent the regulatory hiatus to carry out testosterone suppression.
After her impressive performance in the Ivy League, a group of parents of her classmates at the University of Pennsylvania wrote a letter to the NCAA, accusing it of not creating for women “a protected and equitable space to compete.”
“What is at stake is the integrity of women’s sport. The precedent that is being set … is a direct threat to female athletes in all sports. Where are the limits? How is this compatible with the NCAA commitment to providing a fair environment for student athletes? “
The champion’s lost advantages
In the case of swimming, male records are on average 11% faster, according to studies on transgender athletes by experts Emma Hilton and Tommy Lundberg. However, the hormone replacement therapy that Thomas underwent only makes that difference by 2% or 3%.
Thomas says that as a woman she is not even the shadow of the athlete she was when she competed in the men’s section. Speaking to the specialized outlet Swim Swam, the 22-year-old swimmer claimed to have lost muscle mass and strength after her therapy.
Thomas draws on a recent precedent, the framework published by the IOC for Justice, Inclusion and Non-Discrimination based on Gender Identity and Sexual Variations.
The document was published on November 16 and seeks to protect “the right to practice sports without discrimination”, while preserving “the credibility of competitive sport”, which “rests on a level playing field, where no athlete has an advantage. unfair and disproportionate over the rest “.
The IOC seeks to offer a framework for the establishment of admission criteria, but establishes that they will be defined by the international federations of each sport, according to their particularities.
Cases like that of Hubbard and Thomas still have to pass under many scrutiny, both scientific and human rights, before there is a consensus to replace controversy.
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