Thu, July 24, 2025
Transgender cyclist wins discrimination case against UCI
A transgender cyclist has won a discrimination case against the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI). The Brussels Civil Court ruled in favour of the cyclist after the UCI refused her a licence to participate in the women’s events in 2023.
In 2023, the UCI introduced a requirement that transgender athletes must prove that they began transitioning before puberty in order to compete in the women’s category. It also requires transgender women to display low testosterone levels.
The cyclist in question was born male in 1974 and transitioned in her early forties. She sued the UCI because she argued that the 2023 regulation that prohibited her participation constituted discrimination, and the Brussels Civil Court ruled in her favour.
The UCI medical regulations on eligibility rules for transgender athletes establishes “discrimination prohibited” by Belgian law, pursuant to a December 2008 decree on gender equality, the court ruled. Therefore, the court’s verdict was that the cyclist should be able to compete in the women’s category.
Belgium’s Institute for the Equality of Women and Men, a civil party in the case, voiced that the order was “directly enforceable” and sets a precedent within Belgium.
The Belgian Cycling Federation is reportedly in talks with the UCI about how transgender regulations should be applied.
This verdict may come as a shock considering the recent shift which has seen the introduction of much stricter gender eligibility rules.
World Boxing announced that compulsory sex testing would be introduced “to ensure the safety of all participants and deliver a competitive level playing field for men and women,” World Athletics has approved swab testing to determine if an athlete is biologically female and therefore eligible for the women’s category, the NGB, Table Tennis England, for instance, also recently announced that it will “impose restrictions on the eligibility of transgender and non-binary players.”
The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC) has banned transgender women from women’s sport, stating that it has an “obligation to comply” with Donald Trump’s executive order, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports,” signed in February, and it is expected that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Kirsty Coventry will follow suit and ban transgender athletes and athletes with Difference of Sex Development (DSD) from the female category altogether too.
