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Feature
- no longer necessary.
Dr Richard Budgett, Director of
Science at the IOC, the organisation’s lead
on transgender issues says, “It is important
for cisgender [unambiguously male or
female] and transgender athletes to get a
resolution, as agreed as it can be, which is as
competitive, and fair, as it can be.
“Where the real argument starts,” says
Dr Budgett, “Is where you get signifi cant
championships
[or]
prize
money,”
concluding, “So we need to sort it out as
soon as we can.”
Tennis legend Martina Navratilova,
who was a friend and rival of American
Renée Richards, who, in 1976, became the
fi rst transgender athlete to take plart on the
Ladies Singles at the US Open considers
that the creation of an exclusive and
separate category of transgender competitor
and competition, rather than enforced
Meanwhile, the International Golf
Federation (IGF) had not, at the time of going
to press, responded to multiple requests for
their position on these matters. One prominent
openly-gay member of the Ladies European
Tour, who did not wish to be named told
Bunker Mentality, on the understanding of
anonymity, “Hyperandrogenism, DSD or
male-to-female transitioning are already
signifi cant – and controversial – issues in
sports such as athletics, cycling and volleyball,
so why should golf consider it is exempt from
or oblivious to such developments?
“A six-foot-plus former male, transitioning
to female, even were they were forced to
take
testosterone-reduction
medication,
would remain a six-foot-plus athlete with the
physiological advantages of muscular-skeletal
legacies, which would manifest itself in
driving and long-iron distances, enabling them
to potentially overpower not only courses set
Tifanny Abreu Navrati Lova & Perkins
up for ladies competition, but also the vast
majority of players who were born - and
remain - unambiguously female.”
The IOC allows trans-men (female-to-
male) athletes to participate in competitions
without restrictions, but requires trans-women
(male-to-female) to meet certain criteria,
including a testosterone level below 10
nanomoles per litre of blood, the lower end of
what is considered normal in men; surely, by
perverse, but unarguable logic, that constitutes
tacit confi rmation of a far-from-
level playing fi eld? Such trans-
women athletes are screened
for testosterone levels in
the 12 months prior to
their fi rst competitive
appearance
under
their newly aligned
gender status, and
throughout the period
of competition, but sex
reassignment
surgery,
which was once required
to compete, is – thankfully
pharmaceutical intervention to be the most
effective, and fair solution to an issue that will
only intensify and increase going forward.
But, just below the elite level, even in
club golf, trans-golfers can fi nd life diffi cult,
as Alison Perkins, the only transgender
PGA-qualifi ed professional in the UK, who
participated in a BBC documentary, The Trans
Women Athlete Dispute presented by Ms.
Navratilova, which aired in June this year.
The 18-time tennis grand slam champion
had caused a social media fi restorm
with her views that male athletes
transitioning
to
female
enjoyed
a
competitive
advantage as a direct
consequence of having
originally
developed
through puberty, as a
male, comments she
later tempered in tone
but did not alter in
opinion.
The
openly-gay
Navratilova,
a
nine-time
Caster Semenya
Wimbledon champion, had written in a UK
newspaper article earlier this year, “To put the
argument at its most basic, a man can decide
to be female, take hormones if required by
whatever sporting organization is concerned,
win everything in sight and perhaps earn a
small fortune, and then reverse his decision and
go back to being male,” adding, “It’s insane.”
Research shows that, in comparison
between Driving Distance statistics on the
PGA TOUR and the all-female LPGA Tour,
the average men’s drive is 305.5m, compared
to the female average of 271.3m, a difference
of more than 10%, whilst the 6,549 yardage of
the Country Club of Charleston, venue for the
2019 US Women’s Open was 910-yards less
than Bethpage Black, where the equivalent
men’s US Open was staged this year, almost
14% shorter.
In golf, especially professional golf,
power, strength and length matter, and matter
a lot.
Those two matters of indisputable fact,
namely the respective driving distances and US
Open course lengths, must, beyond reasonable
doubt, suggest that a former male golfer, when
reassigned as, ‘Female,’ and having complied
with the IOC requirements governing gender
transitioning, would, without question and in
theory at least, enjoy a physiological advantage
over unambiguously, 100% female (cisgender)
golfers.
So, why does the R&A appear not have
any contingency plans in place in anticipation
of such as occurrence, let alone actively
planning for an eventuality some consider
inevitable in the medium to long term, why
is the USGA still operating an out-of-date
‘Gender Policy’ dating back to 2005 and why
does the IGF ignore requests for clarifi cation
on where it stands on such important and
pressing matters?
GolfPlus
Dutee Chand
NOVEMBER
2019
45