The Olympics’ elephant in the room

STUMPY’S SHORT SHOTS – RICK DREWER
WHEN the New Zealand Olympic
committee confirmed on
June 21 that Laurel Hubbard had
been selected in the Kiwis’ team
for the Tokyo Games, the reverberations
were heard around the
sporting world.
Hubbard, 43, will become the
first-ever openly transgender athlete
to compete in an Olympic
Games.
Laurel fully transitioned from
eight years ago at the age of 35.
Hubbard stands 185cm tall and
will be competing in the +87kg
weightlifting category of the combined
snatch and clean and jerk
competition in Japan, and is expected
to step onto the Olympic
stage weighing about 120kg.
Before her transition, Hubbard
competed in men’s events, setting
national records in junior competitions.
After transitioning, Hubbard
competed in women’s events for
the first time in 2017 at the Australian
International and Australian
Open in Melbourne, winning gold
in the +90kg division with a 123kg
snatch and a 145kg clean and jerk
for a combined total of 268kg at a
bodyweight of 131.83kg.
To be fair, Hubbard met all the
eligibility requirements to compete.
But her victory triggered considerable
controversy, with some
competitors claiming that the
event was unfair.
Former Australian Weightlifting
Federation’s chief executive
Michael Keelan spoke out against
Hubbard’s eligibility in women’s
weightlifting, arguing it wasn’t a
true level playing field.
“It was unfair to the other competitors;
I am totally against it,” he
said.
“It is great for integration, but
we are trying to make a level playing
field, and we have someone
with obvious physical advantages.”
Hubbard won two gold medals
at the 2019 Pacific Games in Samoa,
but the decision to allow her
to compete was criticised by the
Pacific Games’ chairman, and also
Samoa’s prime minister, before
also going on to win the gold medal
in the +87kg event at the Roma
World Cup in Italy.
This isn’t an issue of accepting
the trans community, it is about the
women competing in the +87kg
division who may rightly believe
they have no chance of competing
with someone built the way Hubbard
is built.
The facts are that for 35 years of
her life, Hubbard lived with male
levels of hormones, with physical
advantages that have been proven
to be significant, and not fully reversible
just by taking away certain
hormones.
Males, on average, have 25
per cent greater aerobic capacity,
60 per cent greater upper body
strength, and 66 per cent greater
lower body strength than a female.
These innate physiological advantages
do not simply disappear.
I totally respect and feel for a
person such as Hubbard being
trapped inside the wrong body.
But when competing in a sport
that essentially comes down to raw
strength, to say it is an even playing
field seems illogical, and puts
Hubbard’s heavyweight competitors
at Tokyo’s Games in a very
tough spot.
Have your say:
Contact Rick at
editor@bunyippress.com.au