IOC chief Kirsty Coventry calls for protecting women’s athletics during global trans athlete wave

The new president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Kirsty Coventry, addressed the topic of transgender athletes competing in women’s sports at her first official news conference since taking over on Thursday, and said that there is “overwhelming support” by IOC members to protect the female category. 

“We understand that there’ll be differences depending on the sport … but it was very clear from the members that we have to protect the female category, first and foremost to ensure fairness,” Coventry said. 

“But we need to do that with a scientific approach and the inclusion of the international federations who have already done a lot of work in this area.”

The new president added that there is “unanimous” support for coming to an agreement about how to amend the policy, and suggested the IOC may take inspiration from the World Athletics policy, which restricts biological males from competing in women’s sports if those males have gone through male puberty. 

“It was very clear from the membership the discussion around this has to be done with medical and scientific research at the core, so we are looking at the facts and the nuances and the inclusion of the international federations that have done so much of this work … having a seat at table and sharing with us because every sport is different,” she said.

“But it was pretty much unanimously felt that the IOC should take a leading role in bringing everyone together to try and find a broad consensus.”

However, Coventry also said any changes likely wouldn’t result in retroactively changing the results of past competitions that featured athletes with gender-eligibility questions. The 2024 Paris Olympics featured two boxers winning gold in women’s competition, despite previously failing gender-eligibility tests for international competitions. 

“We’re not going to be doing anything retrospectively. We’re going to be looking forward. From the members [it] was ‘What are we learning from the past, and how are we going to leverage that and move that forward to the future?’” Coventry said. 

Last year, the United Nations released study findings that say nearly 900 biological females have fallen short of the podium because they have been beaten out by transgender athletes.

The study, titled “Violence against women and girls in sports,” said that more than 600 athletes did not medal in more than 400 competitions in 29 different sports, totaling over 890 medals, according to information obtained up to March 30.

“The replacement of the female sports category with a mixed-sex category has resulted in an increasing number of female athletes losing opportunities, including medals, when competing against males,” the report said.