Opinion | Caster Semenya punished by the IAAF for being Caster Semenya amid misguided transgender debate
- The South African middle distance star is being hammered for something she did not inject or ingest
- The athlete is the odd recipient of one of the most brain-dead rulings, while we let actual men compete against women
Buried somewhere within Lionel Messi’s DNA there must be a coding that makes him able to do what he did against Liverpool in the Uefa Champions League on Thursday.
Exceptional athletes are handed something by God or science, depending on your beliefs, while they are still in the womb.
Sure, hard work, dedication, environment and practise all come into play, but for players such as Messi, they have been given exceptional gifts on a cellular level.
It is what makes sport so beautiful. You can’t manufacture talent and that is why athletes regularly rise from slums, favelas and inner city alleyways. No amount of money or training can make up for genetic gifts – and practise and environment only go so far in refining an athlete’s skills.
The landmark ruling handed down by the International Association of Athletics Federations this week (upheld on appeal) centres around testosterone limits for female runners. The defendant, or should I say victim, in this ruling is female runner Caster Semenya, who must now reduce her testosterone levels to compete. This is not only a slap in the face for Semenya, but the thing that makes sports so beautiful: naturally gifted athletes are such a treat to watch.
The South African has hyperandrogenism (a medical condition which means she produces higher than normal levels of testosterone) and this ruling is so idiotic one wonders how professionals could have made it, and how long it will stand (note: she can apparently still compete in 5,000 metre events or longer, yet another glimpse into the airhead rules set up by the IAAF).