Semenya’s hope
World Athletics under pressure as scientists query gender rules
Caster Semenya’s lawyers say they have fresh hope of controversial World Athletics testosterone regulations being ditched after the governing body’s scientists admitted the findings that helped trigger the rules “could have been misleading”.
Semenya was not allowed to defend her double Olympic 800metres title in Tokyo, under rules prohibiting athletes with Differences of Sexual Development (DSD) from competing internationally at distances from 400m to one mile unless they take hormone-lowering medication.
But World Athletics is facing calls from her legal representatives to scrap the regulations, after the governing body’s scientists admitted some of their findings were “on a lower level of evidence”.
That evidence, gathered by two World Athletics scientists in 2017, found a performance increase in females with high testosterone levels over those with low levels of 1.8 per cent for 800m and 2.7 per cent for 400m.
However, the British Journal of Sports Medicine, which published the original evidence, has now released a “correction”, causing campaigners to argue that the rules should be ditched immediately.
Semenya’s lawyers have also questioned why it was not released until after the Olympics concluded.
Discussing potential links between high levels of testosterone and improved performance in women, Stephane Bermon, director of World Athletics’ health and science department, and his predecessor, Pierre-yves Garnier, wrote: “To be explicit, there is no confirmatory evidence for causality in the observed relationships reported. We acknowledge that our 2017 study was exploratory.
“With this in mind, we recognise that statements in the paper could have been misleading by implying a causal inference. Specifically, ‘Female athletes with high ft [testosterone] levels have a significant competitive advantage over those with low ft in 400m, 400m hurdles, 800m, hammer throw, and pole vault’. This statement should be amended to: ‘High ft levels in female athletes were associated with higher athletic performance over those with low ft in 400m, 400m hurdles, 800m, hammer throw, and pole vault’.”
The scientists conclude that their findings are “on a lower level of evidence” and should be viewed as “exploratory, nothing else, that is, not confirmatory or evidence for a causal relationship”.
Semenya missed Tokyo after unsuccessful challenges against the regulations at the Court of Arbitration for Sport and Switzerland’s supreme court. She is awaiting a hearing at the European Court of Human Rights, although World Athletics has argued it would not be bound by a ruling from there.
“This is very significant new information,” her lawyer, Gregory Nott, of Norton Rose Fulbright, told The Daily Telegraph. “We are in the midst of the European Court of Human Rights case and will be discussing with our London QC and the whole legal team how to introduce the information into proceedings.
“World Athletics have recently given notice of their wish to intervene in the European Court of Human Rights proceedings and we would hope that they will now support setting aside the regulations.
“It is more than surprising that World Athletics did not reveal this evidence before the Olympics and allow Caster to defend her title.”
World Athletics believes the information in this week’s “correction” is not new and was fully taken into account by the CAS, which noted the scientists’ concessions that the evidence “cannot provide evidence for causality” and could only “indicate associations”.
A spokeswoman said: “It has no bearing on the decade of research undertaken by World Athletics that informed its eligibility regulations for the female classification.
“These erratum concessions were made at the CAS in 2019, so considered by the CAS panel, and recorded in the CAS award, made public, that upheld our regulations. Moreover, since 2017 several peer-reviewed publications have supported a causal relationship between elevated serum testosterone levels and improved anthropometric/physiological features and athletics performance in young females.”
The governing body also claims discussions with the British Journal of Sports Medicine had been ongoing for a number of years and the timing of the publication was not chosen by them.
World Athletics president Lord Coe earlier this month said Christine Mboma’s surprise Tokyo 200m silver medal showed it was right to crack down on women with naturally elevated testosterone levels.
In April, the Namibian ran the second-fastest 400m time in the world this year, but was told before Tokyo that she was banned from contesting the event due to her DSD status. However, she made a late switch to the 200m and won silver.