The New York Times ran a lengthy piece over the weekend about the transgender-sports debate. One section on Lia Thomas, the male NCAA swimmer, makes a bold concession (at least by the Times’ standards):
When Ms. Thomas entered women’s meets, she rose substantially in national rankings. Among men, she had ranked 32nd in the 1,650-yard freestyle; among women, she ranked eighth and won a race this season by a margin of 38 seconds.
She had ranked 554th in the men’s 200-yard freestyle; she tied for fifth place in this race in the women’s 2022 N.C.A.A championship.
And she ranked 65th in the men’s 500-yard freestyle but won the title as a female.
“Lia Thomas is the manifestation of the scientific evidence,” said Dr. Ross Tucker, a sports physiologist who consults on world athletics. “The reduction in testosterone did not remove her biological advantage.”
The report also notes: “The records for elite adult male swimmers are on average 10 percent to 12 percent faster than the records of elite female swimmers, an advantage that has held for decades.”