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news
National Cycling Centre (British Cycling).jpgUCI bars transgender cyclist Emily Bridges from debut as woman at National Omnium Championships this weekend
British Cycling has confirmed that transgender cyclist Emily Bridges will not now make her competitive debut as a woman at the National Omnium Championships in Derby this weekend, saying that the UCI has informed it that under current regulations, she “is not eligible to participate in this event.”
We will have more on this story in the morning. In the meantime, in a statement released this evening, the national governing body said:
At British Cycling, we believe that transgender and non-binary people should be able to find a home, feel welcome and included, and be celebrated in our sport.
Under the British Cycling Transgender and Non-Binary Participation policy, Emily Bridges was due to participate in the British National Omnium Championships on Saturday 2nd April. We have now been informed by the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) that under their current guidelines Emily is not eligible to participate in this event.
We have been in close discussions with the UCI regarding Emily’s participation this weekend and have also engaged closely with Emily and her family regarding her transition and involvement in elite competitions. We acknowledge the decision of the UCI with regards to Emily’s participation, however we fully recognise her disappointment with today’s decision.
Transgender and non-binary inclusion is bigger than one race and one athlete – it is a challenge for all elite sports. We believe all participants within our sport deserve more clarity and understanding around participation in elite competitions and we will continue to work with the UCI on both Emily’s case and the wider situation with regards to this issue.
We also understand that in elite sports the concept of fairness is essential. For this reason, British Cycling is today calling for a coalition to share, learn and understand more about how we can achieve fairness in a way that maintains the dignity and respect of all athletes.
Within recent years, we’ve seen huge advancements in the science and testing around elite sports, the broader scientific and understanding of human biology, developments in protection provided by the law, and crucially a greater respect for the psychological and societal challenges of those who are transgender and non-binary. This is a complex area and by uniting, we can share resources and insights.
We know that some of these conversations are happening in pockets of the sporting world, but we want to encourage all sporting governing bodies, athletes, the transgender and non-binary athlete community, the Government and beyond to come together and find a better answer.
Across sports, far more needs to be done, collectively, before any long-term conclusions can be drawn.
Below is our original article, published at 1215 today.
A transgender cyclist who was once part of the men’s Great Britain Academy Programme, and who last month won a men’s race at the British Universities Track Championships, looks set to make her competitive debut as a woman against some of the country’s top female riders including multiple Olympic champion Dame Laura Kenny at the National Omnium Championships in Derby this weekend – although some competitors are said to be afraid to speak out about her potential participation in the event.
Emily Bridges, aged 21, revealed her struggles with gender dysphoria and the impact it was having on her, including depression and feeling isolated, in an article written for Sky Sports that was published on Coming Out Day in October 2020.
She started undergoing hormone therapy last year, and her testosterone levels are now sufficiently low to allow her to compete in women’s events under British Cycling’s Transgender and Non-Binary Participation Policy.
First published in 2020, the latest version of the policy was published in January this year following a consultation last summer that attracted 600 responses.
Transgender athletes are required to have testosterone levels below 5 nanomoles per litre for a year (men generally range between 10 and 30 nanomoles per litre) before being permitted to compete against other women.
Announcing the update, British Cycling said: “Our first Transgender and Non-Binary Participation Policy was designed to be as inclusive as possible, imposing only necessary and proportionate restrictions on eligibility to ensure fair and meaningful competition, based on the most relevant available guidance.”
The governing body said that it would “continue to follow the UCI regulations introduced in March 2020, which are based on objective scientific research and driven by a desire to guarantee fairness and safety within the sport … For this reason, testosterone levels remain the primary method of determining which members are eligible to compete in the male and female categories.”
It added: “While there has been much commentary on the effectiveness of testosterone-based measures, at the current time we do not have sufficient research or understanding to update this area of our policy in a way which is relevant and appropriate for our sport.
“However, we remain committed to moving with international bodies and scientific opinion, and supporting research efforts in any way we can.”
News of Bridges’ likely participation in Derby this weekend has attracted criticism within the media, with Owen Slot, chief sports writer at The Times, writing that should she beat Kenny – five times an Olympic gold medallist, two of those in the Omnium – this weekend, it would underline the unfairness of allowing transgender women to compete in female sports events.
Meanwhile, Olympic silver medal-winning former swimmer Sharron Davies, who believes that despite reduction of testosterone levels, transgender women retain an unfair physical advantage over biological females and should therefore be excluded from women’s sport, says that she has been contacted by women cyclists who are fearful of going public with their concerns.
“British Cycling ought to be ashamed of themselves,” she said, quoted on Mail Online. “I have had quite a few of the girls very distressed on the phone. They are frustrated and disappointed.
“They are all for inclusion but not at the loss of fairness and opportunities for biological females.”
However, Bridges’ mother Sandy, writing on Twitter, said that her daughter may have to have police protection at the championships this weekend.
“This is the reality of being trans today,” she wrote. “That my daughter has to be on a police operation plan to compete in a bike race in the UK. How in any way can that be #SafeToBeMe2022.”
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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301 comments
Having played rugby, there's a reasonable chance he does love it 😉
Yes, but it's not really the commentator's place to advertise it.
Next, they'll be saying how rugby players taste scrummy
I can neither confirm nor deny how rugby players taste....
And you're not even embarrassed by your own hypocrisy. Imagine if, as a straight male, I posted on here about performing sex acts on female athletes. How many likes would I get for that? How many of your Guardian reading sycophants would encourage me further?
How is that "hypocrisy"? Do you understand the words you use, or are you just throwing polysyllabic words out in the hopes it makes you sound like you know what you're talking about?
Btw you do realise how transphobic the guardian is, right? Or are you as stunningly ignorant of that as you are about everything so far in this thread?
If I've offended you JTTGA then I apologise. I sincerely do. You misunderstood me if you thought I was reducing women to just one thing. I meant it as a miracle that can only be achieved by biological women, not the only achievement that biological women can do.
"if" you've offended them you're going to apologise? If?
more weasel words
Have you found proof the person threw the competition yet,as you stated they must have done?
Hear hear
Where are you writing from, Gilead? Are you seriously claiming that all the other millions of wonderful things women can and will and have achieved are inferior to procreating? Are Marie Curie's two Nobel prizes inferior achievements compared to someone having an unwanted child after a drunken one-night stand? Apart from the fact that on a desperately overcrowded and resource-straitened planet arguably the greatest contribution any man or woman can make to humanity is to decide not to procreate, you are reducing women basically to brood mares. Astonishing.
How you are comparing Marie Curie's achievements to a one night stand just shows how far you are from reality Rendel. Again, this isn't twitter. I'm not reducing women to anything, I'm not belittling womens achievements, I'm celebrating them and wanting them do achieve more. Allowing trans women to compete against non-trans women will stop that.
You literally said and have repeated that there is no greater achievement for a woman than giving birth to a child. Therefore you must, logically, believe that every single woman who gives birth, no matter what the circumstances, has achieved something greater than Madam Curie's achievements in science. I don't think it's me who is having trouble with reality here.
ETA - just checked the date, well done, you got me! Silly of me to believe that somebody could really still hold such mediaeval beliefs in the 21st-century.
Personally, I think the greatest achievement for a woman in the modern age is to compete against a man, lose graciously and stand smiling in the silver and bronze positions on the podium. Warms the hearts of women like "getting from whatever it was to wherever it is"...
Well said. In the past, lots of gay people hid their reality in order to be seen as straight because of all the discrimination etc. Times have changed and now they aren't interested in being seen as straight, they're happy and proud to be what they are and to be seen as what they really are. Why can't transgender people be the same and be proud to be different to both men and women?
hi, as a gay cis man I can tell you that, based on my actual lived experience, you're talking nonsense.
Very interesting figure (and very useful for discrediting some of the ill-informed posts that have inevitably appeared on this article...) However, it's certainly not complete (as it acknowledges) - from what I can tell some (most?) individiduals with gender dysphoria would, according to the flowchart, be "typical biological males/females" up until they start any surgery or hormone treatments.
We need to stop confusing sex with ability.
People who produce less testosterone shouldn't be forced to compete with those who do simply because of gender.
.
You're confusing me! Please clarify.
.
Change is healthy. Change is good.
The UCI and the sport will have to adapt along the same path as do people who choose their sexual orientation.
Is it not inevitable that the answer will require the UCI's recategorisation into chromosome XX or XY Competition? These are the facts.
The reference to "men" or "women" is terribly outdated.
I'm not sure why yiure talking about "choice" there. I didn't choose my sexual orientation, nor did I choose my gender. They're both inate.
The UCI and IAAF used to use chromosomes as a way of determining an athlete's sex. It didn't work.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/03/magazine/the-humiliating-practice-of-...
The easy solution to this one is to replace "men's" and "women's" events with "open" and "female".
Whilst that solution is attractive in its simplicity, it fails to address the fundamental issue which is that trans-women will not be satisfied unless they are accepted in the female category, and not the "open".
Because trans women are women, rather obviously.
and rather than discriminate against a tiny minority that want to participate and the larger minority that are trans that would like some confirmation and visibility that transwomen are indeed women in all aspects of society, if you're going to have a crude men/women split in sport, you don't get to decide who is a "true" woman
So you advocate the elimination of competitive sport for natural born women? Or do you want them to turn up, "compete", lose, and stand smiling on the podium?
interesting false dichotomy there
of course, you've got reams of data to show that "natural born women" are going to lose every competition if the tiny number of trans sports people compete? If so, any chance you could show it instead of, you kniw, massive hyperbole that helps no one?
It's a shame it got so close to Emily competing until the ruling was applied but I do feel it's the right outcome. I feel sorry for Emily but I'd have more sympathy for the competitors that she beat if she were allowed to compete.
As someone who suffers from complete testosterone production shutdown I know how powerful testosterone is and the difference it makes.
I hope something can be done that allows trans people to compete but this should not include the erosion of womens sports.
Total own goal by the UCI - there's a surprise! If they were going to move it should have been much much sooner.
We have to be careful - assuming she will win isnt fair on her or her competitors. For all the fuss around Lia Thomas she won 1 of a number of races that weekend, coming 8th in another. Then the 1 race she won was then jumped on as somehow representative of her entire performance - which was all over the place. All over the place for an elite swimmer of course.
The narrative of "Trans women will always win" is being leveraged to stoke hostility by the Right to Trans existence in general, when in fact 99.9% of Trans women arent going near competitive sport.
We also need to be aware that Sport is a tiny tiny piece of transdom and frankly most trans ppl have bigger fish to fry.
There's speculation that Lia Thomas lost on purpose so it doesn't show total dominance. She's also slowed her times in the races she has won too. Some people would say this shows that the performance margin between trans and biological competitors isn't that great. Others could say Lia is playing possum. Either way, we'll never truly know.
I'd argue that no matter where she placed, it displaced someone Lia shouldn't have been racing against.
In other words, she didn't dominate as we expected her to do so she must have not been trying.
That seems to line up with people who state, "I can't see the curve so the earth must be flat".
I don't know where you get that comparison from.
Lia did win a race, so does that make the earth a bit rounder or a bit flatter? She lost some others, so again, does that make it rounder or flatter? Or, does it make it totally unfair that she was even allowed to race at all?
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