World Triathlon Approves Competition and Transgender Athlete Policy Changes

Triathlon Forum
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Originally published at: World Triathlon Approves Competition and Transgender Athlete Policy Changes - Slowtwitch News

World Triathlon this week has announced sweeping changes to its rules and policies, impacting both elite and age group athletes across the spectrum.

The largest of these changes include revisions to World Triathlon’s official transgender athlete policies for both age group and Elite (professional) athletes. In the age group ranks, World Triathlon has created a new Age-Group Open category, which replaces the men’s category, and is applicable to “all  World Triathlon and Continental Triathlon Age-Group competitions.”

All age group transgender athletes are eligible for the Open category without medical or legal eligibility criteria. The age-group female category is now limited to athletes “assigned female at birth.”

At the elite level, transgender women seeking to compete in the female category must still comply with the four year transitory period as required under the prior policy. Athletes must also maintain serum testosterone levels below 2.5 nmol/L, both during the transitory period and beyond. These athletes must also race a minimum number of times over the course of three years in the Age Group Open category, then a final year in the Elite Female category, before full Elite status will be granted. Lastly, athletes falling under the policy must participate in an academic research study in the last three years of this eligibility period.

There is no transitory period, nor testosterone requirements, for transgender men seeking to enter the Elite Male category. A signed declaration of male identity is sufficient.

World Triathlon states that medical information will be “handled with strict confidentiality, ensuring respect for athletes’ privacy.” The full revised policy can be found here.

Other Major Rule Changes for Elite Athletes

The package of rule changes approved by World Triathlon includes major revisions to water quality standards. After multiple headlines and delays with swims in the Seine for the Paris Olympics, World Triathlon has relaxed its minimum acceptable water quality standards.

Acceptable water quality standards for E.coli and Enterococci have been reduced from “excellent” to “good,” effectively doubling the allowable counts of these bacteria in bodies of water prior to swims. Swim cancellations are now no longer subject to a single individual, but “by a group that includes a Medical Committee representative, the Medical Delegate, and the LOC Medical Director.”

Other changes to swimming rules include a requirement that, in order to avoid injuries, “finger and toenails will need to be short in order for the athlete to be authorized to start.” Similarly, jewelry is prohibited. Watches are included under the jewelry prohibition for Elite races, although “the Head Referee may authorize the wearing of watches.”

Elite athletes will now earn equivalent ranking points for all events. The reduction in points for sprint and eliminator events has been removed. World Triathlon states that this change is to “to uphold competitive equity across all race formats.”

Elite athletes are also now subject to new age requirements for most races. The minimum age for most competitions has been raised, with all World Triathlon Championship Series and T100 World Tour events only open to athletes 18 or older. All standard (Olympic) distance events, regardless of level, are also 18+ only. World Cup events that are sprint or shorter are open to 17+; Continental Cup events of the same distance are open to 16+. Mixed Relay events are now 16+ as well.

Speaking of Mixed Relay, the format from now through the 2028 Olympic Games will revert to woman-man-woman-man order for all competitions, as it was for the Tokyo 2020 Games.

Bike position foul penalties have also been changed for non-drafting events. First, there has been unification around a standard 12-meter draft zone, as well as 25 seconds to complete a pass. Drafting penalties have been reduced across the board:

  • Long Distance: Reduced to 3 minutes
  • Middle Distance: Reduced to 2 minutes
  • Standard Distance: Reduced to 1 minute
  • Sprint Distance: Reduced to 30 seconds

Lastly, Elite athletes are now permitted to wear sleeved kits for all event distances, so long as the sleeves do not extend beyond the elbow. These kits still must retain a back zipper, and advertising on kits is still limited to the same size area as non-sleeved kits.

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Could you add a clarification about how these rules impact participants in Ironman-branded races? I’ve seen an athlete who worried she (a trans woman) would be pushed into an open category rather than being allowed to compete with athletes assigned female at birth.

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Just to clarify, there is no longer a male and female division, but an open and female division. So to avoid the appearance of misgendering a few athletes we are going to actually ungender over 60% of them? Is anyone satisfied with that. A person who has gone to great lengths to change their appearance as female, or for whatever reason doesn’t want to race with males, still has to race with males an they just call them Opens.

The Open terminology is a little tricky, as the term is sometimes used to describe a division where pros and amateurs compete together. At least that’s what I would assume if presented with a registration field and I was signing up in the “Open” division.

Is the big news here that the T100 draft zone just got reduced to 12m? Or do the penalties changes and draft zone unification for all events not apply to T100?

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Ironman race rules to my understanding would allow them to compete in their own Open category, and didn’t consolidate males et all into an Open category but didn’t allow them to compete for WC slots.

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IDGAF what they call the groups. Call it Dudes and Chicks for all I care. What is substantive is this:

They are still allowing MtF to compete after 4 years, even though the evidence of carried advantage is unequivocal. FtM is less of an issue but still has the potential for hormone abuse for the sake of performance, however we haven’t seen examples tat prove that to be a winning strategy. I’m not sure why this is even a discussion, let alone an actual rule.

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I was kinda confused about this too…sounds like they’ve done a good job correcting the issue of men competing against women at the age group level, but still allowing it at the pro level…I thought if anything the pro level would have been the one to be more strict about it.

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The WT way ahead on this was foreseen with the election of Arimany and his slate by Tim Heming in this article:

“on the thorny transgender issue, the incumbents are aligned with IOC policy. This allows athletes who have been through male puberty to compete in women’s events rather than following the lead of World Athletics or British Triathlon to block this.”

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While in a practical sense you are right, in the “words matter” world… well, words matter. If we had a Male division a Female division and an “Other” division, we’d accurately be accused of literally “otherizing” a group of people. (In this case, I guess that’s what some of them want, but not what others of them want at the same time)

Otherizing a gender and Openizing a gender is not much difference (ie, why not just call it Other. There’s Female and the Other division, it sounds a little offensive to only acknowledge one gender for the existence of sport).

It’s a little bizarre, because as you imply the ruling clearly acknowledges that the m-to-f transitioner would have an advantage over the age group female division, so they must compete with the men in the “open” division. And yet that’s not the solution at the Elite level for some reason. Bizarre. BUT, I do think they are basically punting and following someone else’s rules here and will eventually settle back down to “normal” once the dust settles.

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Nope: remains 20m for T100 and 3 minutes if penalised. However note for draft-illegal races it’s gone up from 10m to 12m in standard distances (and shorter).
App’x V 11.1. Draft Zone - 20 meters - measured from the leading edge of the front wheel. (p213)

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IM’s rules remain the same, currently.

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At that’s correct. I forgot the local Olympic and USAT Nats tri was 10m.

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Not sure I would classify a new rule that only affects a few people, the “largest” of rule changes. All those other ones affect many more if not all athletes. Is there even one pro attempting to compete in the womens division that was born a man?? Not to say it is not important to clarify the parameters, just that it affects so few that it should be the smallest change…

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Raises hand! Doesn’t this simplify the female category to basically take out our “interpretation” of what is or isn’t female. (“You” may not like that they define it that way but it seems they basically have turned female division into the “biological” definition that we have had as humans for thousands of years of what being female was. So again it’s ok if you don’t like it, but it seems like they made the rules much simplier this way. Seems it’s a yes/no flow chart now to the categories and less what each person’s “idea” of what is or isn’t female….so maybe change the name to something more basic biological than female so it’s even more “PC”?)

Of course this will start to get into a debate where people start saying “you don’t care” about people’s feelings. I actually think this is a win for protecting women in sports. And guess what everyone can still race. Someone may not like how or why they defined the category, and that’s ok.

Within the elite category for female athletes? What’s the difference in being in the 1 year transition but your in the elite female category vs elite female category the next year. Are they going to put an * on their profile?

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60% of all competitors in ‘womens’ division identify as that outside their biological sex? Have some data on that?

Anyways, as someone pointed out, f2m elite can be troubling, as male hormones can be taken at a performance increasing level. The world record doped womens 800m run, still which remains unbroken is tied with #960 in 2024 for men in college athletics. So not competitive there, but niche sport like tri maybe more significant

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I’m not worried about the difference between 1y and 4y from transition. I’m worried about the retained or carried advantage from having gone through puberty as a man. That isn’t erased by any years of hormone therapy and there’s plenty of evidence to prove it.

If you were born as a man you should not be allowed to complete in women’s sport. Full stop. DSD is a separate thing, volitional transition is not a reasonable cause for competing as woman.

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I’m asking more procedurally. If they have a 4 year transition period, but they can participate fully in the elite category, is that not a 3 year period vs 4 years?

IE what does “full elite status” mean? I guess it means you have to keep testosterone levels below in that transition period.

So again are they now going to have to add an * to athletes, so we know which females are “full elite status” and which aren’t? Or is it something that only the athlete+WT will know within those that are transitioning? Should elites know who is and isn’t “female” in their competition?

And to your other points…That is basically what this ruling does. So when @Lurker was asking who is this good for…Biological females aka “women’s sports”.

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Ahhh that’s a good point. Triathlon rule writers have been having a rough few years.

Read the rules twice, first to see what they say, them to see how you get around them. Seems there may be a way to game the MtF transition rules as well.

The asterisk is a good question. I believe that yes it should be known, as a sporting question. But that’s a weird one, and I don’t think they should be allowed to compete as women anyway, so it would be a non issue

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I read that to be that all males are now going to be in the open class, ie ‘ungendered’. And in almost all races that I’ve been in over the last 20 years then the male fields have been bigger than the female fields, hence the 'over 60%. Was my reading of the comment.

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So non-binary athletes “assigned female at birth" like Nikki Hiltz, who runs at the pro level in the women’s division, who go here?

I think that at a certain point - and maybe this is the overall goal - trans athletes are gonna say “fuck this bullshit” and stop competing at a pro level entirely

Which would eventually hurt the sport (and ALL sports, to be honest)

Triathlon was founded by outcasts, knuckleheads, and weirdos; its Mecca is WAY THE FUCK in the middle of the Ocean; shouldn’t it be more accepting of marginalized people (including respecting the Hawai’ians, who accepted a surge of haoles every year) should be leading the way of “come here! Be who you WANT to be” not “be who we TELL you to be”

I could be wrong :transgender_flag::rainbow_flag:

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I think within the elite rules, they way they have it written, they can win the “PC” side by saying “see transgenders can have a spot in elites” but actually keep the bar so high to actually transition that likely wont result in many doing it. Not only do you have a 4 year period of testing, you also have to be a lab rat for 3 of those years in which they’ll just likely use research to put in stricter standards. Essentially they are saying if someone wants to jump through that many hoops while still having to race the top level of the sport to get to that level; more power to them.

I’m still interested in the procedural part of that though. Within USAT you have to finish within top 3 of female division in specific elite qualifying AG races in order to qualify for your elite license. So for Americans is that now impossible to achieve for a transgender athlete since they’ll always being competing in the "open’ category?