I have a feeling this might end up being the big story of the olympics this year. Castor Semenya, the South African middle distance runner, made the press a few years ago when she had to take a gender test following some impressive results.
As far as I am aware, the results were never publically released, but it is generally accepted that she is intersex, i.e. she has internal male genitalia and makes higher levels of male androgenic hormones than most women. There was a rule in place that said that such athletes needed to have testosterone levels below a certain concentration, and Semenya kind of faded into the backround.
Last year the testosterone limit was removed, and since then Semenya has been running incredible times. She has had meets where she has won the 400m, 800m and 1500m in one day! She seems to be cruising whilst running some of the fastest times ever set by a woman.
The question does arise though, is it fair to the women who are not intersex and have lower levels of testosterone, that they compete against someone with these advantages? I see it as similar to allowing a doped man to compete, except that in this case, Castor Semenya is not to blame and has done nothing wrong herself.
A little like with Pistorius in previous years, it seems like it is a problem that is brushed aside as relatively unimportant when the athlete in question is a midpack runner, but when they start to win the medals and maybe even take down world records, it becomes a lot more important.
If Semenya runs a sub1:52 800m, it will make a mockery of women’s athletics. Basically no woman with normal female androgen levels will be able to compete. So what is the answer? Well that is a tough one. I think either a limit needs to be reintroduced to allow a leveller playing field (they can never make it fair, as sex isn’t as binary as most think). That limit would mean that Semenya (and others) would either have to control her testosterone levels, or compete in the open division, i.e. anyone can compete i.e. generally a man’s race.
I feel for Semenya, she has said in the past that she considers jogging in 2nd place finished so as not to make too many headlines. It seems likely though that in Rio she will win 2 golds, and maybe take down some long standing world records. She will be under a lot of scrutiny if that happens, I hope everyone remembers though that she has done nothing wrong, and the system needs to be fixed, not Castor Semenya.