While the World Surf League’s 2023 Championship Tour season has gotten underway to somewhat mild conditions at the Pipeline Pro, wave-wise, there has been no shortage of drama unfolding over the first few days. Amidst the technology issues, the early upsets and interferences in the contest, what has really taken the surf sphere by storm is the recent rule change; the WSL adopting the ISA’s policy about transgender athletes.
Last Friday, Jessi Miley-Dyer, Chief of Sport for the WSL, sent an email to competitors listing 5 ‘key rule changes’, the adoption of the transgender policy being listed, with a link to the ISA’s policy. This policy states:
“An athlete who was assigned male at birth, who identifies as a woman, and has woman/female on her passport or national identity card is eligible to compete in a men’s event, or as a man in a mixed event, if she has not met requirements to compete in a woman’s event (such as maintaining testosterone level less than 5 nmol/L continuously for the previous 12 months).”
A controversial topic to say the least, transgender athletes spanning all sports have seen debates world wide. Now joining the ranks amongst “The World Governing Authority for Surfing”, or the ISA, is “The Global Home of Surfing” that is the WSL. JMD spoke to The Inertia about the rule change, which is viewed as a step forward in equality, “The WSL is working hard to balance equity and fairness and it’s important for a policy to be in place. We recognize that the policy may need to evolve over time as we get feedback and see new research in the field.”
The WSL will not be testing the athletes themselves. Instead, the surfer will present their own documentation and testing to the chief medical officer. For those not in the know (like me), average testosterone levels for males is between 265 and 923, while for females it is between 15 and 70, measured in ng/dl, as noted by Medical News Today.
Different sports have different policies, some calling for even lower levels of testosterone, as well as testing at that lower level for a much longer duration. For example, FINA, swimming’s world governing body, has a rule set that deems only swimmers who transitioned before the age of 12 eligible for elite women’s swimming competition. The WSL’s newly adopted rule might be viewed as rather lax in comparison.
Since this development was announced, a rather well-known professional female surfer* voiced her opinion of discord via social media. The video has seen 134K likes in 2 days, doubling the viewership of the WSL’s Women’s quarterfinals competition today (64K), as well as making national news. The comment section is an emotionally charged warzone, with quite a few other prominent surf figures chiming in. I told you, stealing the thunder from the Pipeline Pro.
While there is only one known transgender surfer who has won a major competition thus far, the ISA and the WSL were in need of a policy with the sport of surfing now being included in the Olympics. Of course this will not bring an end to the ongoing (read: never-ceasing) debate about inclusivity, fairness, and equality, but at least there are guidelines in place for now that can be used for future reference. Whether these protocols are good, favorable, unfair, or unkind is more a matter of opinion than fact at this point. However, rules are rules. Let’s all do our best to follow them.
Thank you for the time,
-hwilsin
*If you’re interested, the surfer I was speaking of is Bethany Hamilton. Have a look at her Instagram page.