![]() After several false starts, the testosterone guidelines were codified in 2018. Mboma and Masilingi, then, are resigned to their second-best event, collateral damage in World Athletics' ongoing, and ultimately successful, campaign to neutralize South African 800-metre runner Caster Semenya. And if you realize a rule against sharp-eyed southpaw pitchers would create an artificially shallow talent pool in MLB, you can recognize the women's testosterone rule at World Athletics curates the field but diminishes the on-track product. If you can picture MLB forcing left-handers with 100 mph heat and 20/10 vision to play first base, arguing their natural tools were unfair to regular players, then you can understand how arbitrary, targeted unfairness of World Athletics' testosterone guidelines. Mboma's and Masilingi's default hormonal settings are no more an unfair advantage than Kawhi Leonard's giant hands, or keen eyes in Major League Baseball, where the average player sees with 20/13 vision. WATCH | Bring It In panel discusses latest hormone testing ban of Namibian runners:ĭuration 9:10 Morgan Campbell is joined by Dave Zirin and Meghan McPeak to discuss the latest hormone testing ban of Namibian runners Christine Mboma and Beatrice Masilingi, who were barred from competing in the Olympic 400 metre event due to high levels of natural testosterone.Įxcept there's a qualitative difference between anabolic steroids and naturally produced testosterone. From a distance, World Athletics appears to have restored competitive integrity to a high-profile event ahead of the Tokyo Olympics. Mboma and Masilingi opted to drop down to the 200 metres, and the median sports fan, who might associate words like "testosterone" and "permissible limit" with intentional, illegal doping, thinks good-faith rule enforcement caught a pair of cheaters. Or they can switch events, even if it places them at a competitive disadvantage. They can take drugs to lower their natural testosterone, courting a long list of side-effects to comply with World Athletics' guidelines. Women - and only women - whose levels of natural testosterone exceed a limit World Athletics established in 2018, are barred from events between 400 metres and one mile, and faced with a choice. But the examinations found that both women's bodies produce enough natural testosterone to violate World Athletics' convoluted rules on the hormone. The results also raised suspicions among officials at World Athletics, who dispatched doctors to Namibia so the two 18-year-olds could undergo "medical assessments." Those tests revealed neither runner was doping, which both already knew. ![]() Namibia teenagers out of Olympic 400m over high natural testosterone levels. ![]() The country has produced exactly one Olympic medallist - sprinter Frankie Fredericks, who finished second to both Donovan Bailey (100 metres) and Michael Johnson (200) in Atlanta in 1996. Namibia, after all, isn't a track and field powerhouse like Kenya. Those two times, run so close together, by runners so young and from the same country, raised eyebrows. ![]()
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