‘I Would Be A Complete Nobody’: Two-Time Olympian Reacts To Trans Runner In London Marathon

A two-time Olympian said Thursday that she would have been “a complete nobody” if she’d been forced to compete with men when she competed at the elite level.

“It’s absolutely unfair. Males run on average 10% faster than females and this is at the lower end of the male-female performance gap,” Mara Yamauchi, who represented the United Kingdom in the marathon in the 2008 and 2012 Olympics, told “America’s Newsroom” co-host Dana Perino when asked about transgender athlete Glenique Frank’s participation in the London Marathon.

“In punching power it’s about 162%, in jumping, it’s between 25% and 30%, so the female category must be for females at birth only and it’s specifically designed to exclude male advantage,” Yamauchi continued. “So people like Glenique Frank are very welcome in the London Marathon, but they must compete in the male category, because they’re biologically male.”

Frank finished ahead of nearly 14,000 women Sunday, and has offered to return the medal, the New York Post reported. Frank competed in the male division of the New York City marathon in November.

“In 2009, when I was still competing in the marathon at elite level, I was ranked second in the world in women’s road running, but in that year alone, more than 1,000 — or at least 1,300, men ran faster than me,” Yamauchi said. “So if we didn’t have the female category on it, you know, for females only, I would be a complete nobody. Every female would be a complete nobody. We wouldn’t have females in sport.”

Yamauchi said she knew of female athletes who were considering quitting athletic competitions due to being forced to compete against transgender competitors.

“I’ve been in touch with a female masters runner [who] rarely gets on podiums, but she has been on the point of quitting the sport because she’s repeatedly had to compete against males who say they are women,” Yamauchi said.

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