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Comment on A real question about trans athletes and records

EponymousBosh@awful.systems ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

Wow, the 200m freestyle, the 500m freestyle, and the 1650m freestyle, huh? Did she ever compete in anything else, or were those numbers perhaps cherry-picked to make the situation look more dramatic than it actually is? Because if you look at her results holistically, she’s a very good swimmer, but she’s clearly not dominating 100% of the time the way she’s been portrayed.

At the NCAA competition where Thomas won one (1) race that conservatives cried and shit their pants over, a cis woman named Kate Douglass set 18 new records. Lia Thomas set zero new records. And crunching the rest of the numbers bears this out: she was a good swimmer before and after transition, but she’s not some unbeatable powerhouse that cis women have no chance at winning against.

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arcterus@piefed.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
It should also be noted that a college athlete's times and rankings would presumably improve every year. Freshmen competing against seniors are just less likely to win (in most sports at least). IIRC I saw an analysis of her rankings that indicated the improvement was within normal bounds for year-over-year improvement.

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- FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨23⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  No one goes from 500th to 1st year over year lol.
  
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  - arcterus@piefed.blahaj.zone ⁨23⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    She swam for the men's team 2019-2020 while undergoing hormone therapy. Then there was a year break because of COVID. Then she swam for the women's team 2021-2022. That's a two year break.
    
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    FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au ⁨23⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Incorrect.
    
    Before transitioning, Thomas was nationally ranked #462 in the NCAA men’s official swimming competitions. After transitioning, Thomas jumped to #1 in the NCAA women’s category.
    
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damnedfurry@lemmy.world ⁨22⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

were those numbers perhaps cherry-picked to make the situation look more dramatic than it actually is?

If anyone can go from 554th to 5th in any sport/event just by competing among the other sex, nothing else changing, then that obviously indicates something. You can’t handwave that away.

Her personal 100m freestyle time dropping less than a quarter of a second post-transition is honestly a bigger indicator that transition is not making a substantial difference, because that angle completely removes the ‘chance’ element in your opponents being different people.

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