World Aquatics, the governing body behind competitive swimming, is creating a new ‘open category’ that will allow transgender athletes to compete.
This news comes just a week after Union Cycliste Internationale banned trans women from international cycling events.
NBC News reports:
Trans swimmers to be included in an ‘open category’ at competitions, World Aquatics saysSwimming will set up an “open category” that will include transgender competitors, the governing body of the sport said Tuesday.World Aquatics president Husain Al-Musallam said the event would take place in the future among other races but gave no details. Reports suggest it could be this year.“This is a very complex topic,” Al-Musallam said at the World Aquatics Congress in the southwestern Japanese city of Fukuoka. “But I am delighted to tell you today that we are now making plans for the first trial of an open category, and we hope to be able to confirm all the details soon.“Our sport must be open to everybody,” he said.World Aquatics had previously banned transgender competitors from major events like the Olympics and world championships.
See the announcement below:
FOX News has more:
World Aquatics, previously known as FINA before its name change was announced in December, updated its policy for transgender athletes in June 2022 to ban any biological male athletes from competing in women’s events unless they transitioned by the age of 12.”We have to protect the rights of our athletes to compete, but we also have to protect competitive fairness at our events, especially the women’s category at FINA competitions,” Al-Musallam said in a statement at the time.The policy change was spurred by the IOC’s guidelines and recommendation in November 2021 that all international federations develop their own sport-specific eligibility criteria for the women’s competition category.
Is an open category going to be the fix for this issue?
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