World Athletics President Sebastian Coe is confident that all female athletes at this year’s world championships in Tokyo will have undergone gene testing, after snags left some of them scrambling to meet the September 1 deadline.
Athletes who arrive at the September 13-21 global event without having being tested can complete the process in the Japanese capital.
“Although the vast majority of athletes will have been tested before they get to Tokyo … if there are outstanding athletes that still haven’t been tested, we have the ability to do that in Tokyo — but that is by no means an invitation for member federations to wait until they get to Tokyo,” Coe said on a video call on Thursday.
World Athletics approved the introduction of the test to determine if an athlete is biologically female at its council meeting in March.
The testing process has, however, not been all smooth sailing.
Canadian athletes had to rush to retake tests after learning two weeks ago that the ones they had done did not comply with the ruling body’s requirements.
French athletes had to seek meets and camps outside their country to complete the one-off tests after they were ruled illegal in France, and Coe said they will be tested at a pre-Tokyo holding camp.
Coe said over 90 per cent of all female athletes competing in Tokyo had now been tested.
“We will pretty much have met our mission by the time we get to Tokyo,” he said.
“And the mission was very clear. It wasn’t to necessarily have all the results in place, but it was to have the bulk of those female athletes tested.”
While the new rule has been met with some criticism, Coe said the global federation has received overwhelming support for it.
“I don’t think that anybody would be particularly surprised that, given everything that we have done in the past to do what we can to preserve, to protect, to promote the female category, which is absolutely sacrosanct for me,” Coe said.
“And look, we’re testing for a Y chromosome. It’s non-invasive. It’s a one-off test, and the information is destroyed. So I think this is the right place for our sport to be.”
Looking ahead to Tokyo, Coe highlighted ticket sales, with 50,000 spectators expected most nights and several sell-outs.
He also pointed to the quality of the high-profile athletes taking part, including sprinters Noah Lyles, Letsile Tebogo and Julien Alfred, hurdler Grant Holloway and pole vaulter Mondo Duplantis.
“I think we are in that period of athletics, where we’ve got athletes for the ages,” he said.
“I’m not going to regale you with all the names of the headline acts, but for every one of those names, there is jaw- dropping potential.”
