A group of elite female swimmers from Roanoke College in Virginia spoke out about the “demoralizing” battle they had after a trans-identifying male swimmer joined the team and said the school did nothing to help them.
The swim captains called on schools across the country to create a plan for dealing with trans athletes and said they were shocked their school left it up to them to tell the swimmer if they had a problem with him, the Daily Mail reported.
“There’s no blueprint for this, which is also why we want to stand up and get our voices heard,” captain of the sophomore team Kate Pearson told the outlet. “Because there should be, there should be a blueprint for this kind of thing.”
“There’s so many ‘grown ups’ around that should be making these decisions,” she added. “That’s part of their job. It was just a hot mess. I was like, what is happening.”
Fellow senior captain Bailey Gallagher said, “It was so exhausting, every aspect: emotionally, physically, mentally. It was just the longest month of our entire life.”
She added that it was “so defeating” watching how fast the biological male swimmer was. “It’s like, why would we even jump into the pool, and even try to compete against this person? Because we know our best will never compete with their best, right?”
Pearson said the person was known to them as a man and informed them “last year” “of their transition.” The girls said they were supportive of him in his personal life, but thought it was unfair to have to swim against him.
🚨NEW EXCLUSIVE: Elite female swimmers at Roanoke College are demanding urgent action to protect their sport, after a male student joined their women’s team, leaving the coaches and athletes ‘demoralized’, angry, and unsure how to cope.https://t.co/K4f5NwsLCU
— Independent Women’s Forum (@IWF) October 5, 2023
Junior captain Lily Mullens said when they were told the person would be joining the team there was confusion. The three captions decided to hold a meeting to discuss their concerns about competing against a biological male swimmer.
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“And after that meeting, I feel like Kate and Lily can agree, we almost felt like a sense of relief that we weren’t the only people like feeling this way, and that our other teammates also were feeling this way,” Gallagher added.
“The school put so much onto us,” Mullens said. “I feel like and whenever we made efforts to move forward with this to try to express how we felt, every time we were just shoved to the side. Like, we told you guys to do this, but we’re not going to pay attention. It was just so ridiculous.”
A college spokesperson told the outlet no decision had ever been made to allow the trans swimmer to be on the team.
“This fall a Roanoke College student who identifies as trans (male to female) requested consideration to join and compete with the women’s swim team,” the person said. “While the College’s leadership was reviewing NCAA and national sport policies on eligibility, the student withdrew her [his] request before any decision had been made.”
The swimmers told the outlet that they were unaware the swimmer had withdrawn their request to join the girls team and had been told he was a member of their squad.
Last week, the girls said they received a letter indicating the swimmer was withdrawing from the team.
Related: Riley Gaines Blasts Karine Jean-Pierre For Ducking Question On Transgender Athletes