Track officials rule on women and testosterone
The sports world’s highest court in Geneva, Switzerland ruled Wednesday that Olympic champion Caster Semenya and other female runners like her with unusually high testosterone must take medication to reduce their levels of the male sex hormone if they want to compete in certain events.
In a landmark 2-1 decision , the Court of Arbitration for Sport upheld proposed rules issued by track’s governing body, the IAAF, saying that they are discriminatory but that “such discrimination is a necessary, reasonable and proportionate means” of “preserving the integrity of female athletics.”
The IAAF argued that unusually high, naturally occurring levels of testosterone in athletes like Semenya with “intersex” characteristics that don’t conform to standard definitions of male and female give them an unfair competitive advantage, and it decreed a maximum level for females.
The 28-year-old South African runner whose sculpted biceps and superfast, blow-away-the-competition times have led others to question her accomplishments declared she will not be stopped by the ruling.
“I know that the IAAF’s regulations have always targeted me specifically,” Semenya said. “For a decade the IAAF has tried to slow me down, but this has actually made me stronger. The decision of the CAS will not hold me back.”
Golf
The NCAA tournament bound Robert Morris men’s golf team was placed in the Myrtle Beach, S.C. regional May 13-15 at at TPC Myrtle Beach. The entire 81-team and 54-individual field was announced Wednesday night on the Golf Channel during its selection show. This is the first time since 2015 that Robert Morris will compete in the NCAA championships. The Colonials captured their fourth NEC title this past weekend, leading wire-to-wire with a three-round total of 898 (34-over) to top the leader board.
• Alex Beach closed with a 3-under 69 to hold off Danny Balin and win the PGA Professional Championship in Bluffton, S.C. They were among 20 club pros who earned spots in the PGA Championship in two weeks at Bethpage Black.
• Megan Furtney and Erica Shepherd atoned for a semifinal loss a year ago by winning the U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball at Timuquana Country Club in Jacksonville, Fla. Furtney and Shepherd, who plan to play for Duke next year, scored a 2-and-1 victory against Jillian Bourdage and Casey Weidenfeld.
Tennis
Three-time champion Maria Sharapova has withdrawn from the upcoming Italian Open in Rome as she continues to recover from a right shoulder injury. Sharapova’s spot in the draw for the May 13-19 tournament will be taken by 45th-ranked Viktoria Kuzmova of Slovakia.
• Third-seeded Qiang Wang reached the quarterfinals of the Prague Open by defeating Mandy Minella, 6-1, 4-6, 6-4. The Chinese player will face unseeded Bernarda Pera, after the American dispatched Antonia Lottner, 6-2, 6-4.
• Two-time defending champion Alexander Zverev stretched his winning streak at the Munich Open in Germany to nine matches with a 7-5, 6-1 victory against Argentina’s Juan Ignacio Londero.
Soccer
Kacper Przybylko and Fabrice-Jean Picault scored seven minutes apart in the second half as host Philadelphia Union beat expansion FC Cincinnati (2-6-2), 2-0 . Philadelphia (5-3-2) moved atop the Eastern Conference for a three-way tie with D.C. United and the Montreal Impact.