Bleacher report article on the transgender female sprinter in Connecticut. I had a couple of thoughts, and I'm sure other people here do too.
None of this is her fault. The authorities in charge are allowing her to compete in the girl's races so good for her. The adults in Connecticut who are harassing her need to take a good long look in the mirror.
However, it is possible to simultaneously recognize that this arraignment is not fair to her competitors. There is a reason we have a separate category for female athletics. I thought this quote from the article was totally absurd:
"A level playing field is a fallacy," says Dr. Myron Genel, Yale professor emeritus of pediatric endocrinology. He is a member of the International Olympic Committee's Medical Commission on issues regarding gender identity in athletics.
"There's so many other factors that may provide a competitive advantage," Genel says. "It's very hard to single out sex as the only one."
Well, then let's just get rid of women's sports and have 1 open division for everyone. It sounds like Dr. Genel is talking around the issue here because he doesn't want to say something that could be perceived as offensive. Of course sex isn't the ONLY factor, but it is a pretty major one.
If we could compare the genetic make-up of Rudisha, Coe, and Nick Symmonds I'm guessing we'd find some major differences between them. However, their 800 times still fall within a 3sec range of each other. Compare that to the best female 800 runners in the world who run 13-15 seconds slower than the best male 800 runners.