Sports
Namibian Teens To Fight Testosterone Ban
Namibian track and field stars Christine Mboma and Beatrice Masilingi, both aged 18, have turned in four of the top five women’s 400m times in the world this year.
They were on a fast-track to Olympic medals, but then their stellar rise came to a sudden halt.
The pair have been banned from competing in the women’s 400m race at the Tokyo Games. The reasoning: their natural testosterone levels are too high.
The teenagers were both racing at international events when they learned the news.
Christine Mboma was with the duo’s coach, Henk Botha, travelling back to their training camp in Italy. When their plane landed, Botha received a call from Namibia’s Olympic Committee relaying the news. By the time he was able to call Beatrice Masilingi, his other trainee, she had already found out from social media.
The revelation came as a shock to both athletes. Neither of them had been tested before, and they had no reason to think their hormone levels were not within the typical range.
It is not the first time female runners have faced this problem. In 2018, Caster Semenya was banned from competing after World Athletics ruled that “to ensure fair competition, women with high natural testosterone levels must take medication to reduce them to compete in middle-distance races”.
But asking someone to take medication to alter something in a body they are happy with is controversial.
“I would ruin the way my body develops because that’ll be something that rearranges everything, how my body functions and everything,” says Masilingi.
“I wouldn’t want to involve any other things because this is the way my body functions in its normal way. And if I try something else, I might get caught somewhere else, and something might go wrong with my body.”
Beatrice Masilingi is concerned about artificially changing her natural hormone balance
Testosterone is a driver of red blood cell count, and the more red blood cells a person has, the more oxygen they can carry to their muscles, allowing them to run faster for longer amounts of time.
Men typically have higher testosterone levels than women, which is one of the reasons why, on average, they outperform women in athletic competition. And if people take testosterone as a performance-enhancing drug, they will generally perform better, says Dr Richard Holt, professor in diabetes and endocrinology at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Southampton.
Research shows, however, that if you take a group of elite male athletes, all with varying testosterone levels, the ones with higher levels of the hormone do not necessarily perform better than those males with lower levels.
Dr Holt says the same is true of elite female athletes, which is why testosterone cannot be the whole story when it comes to athletic performance.
“There are a number of genetic polymorphisms, slight changes in the genes, that will actually determine whether somebody has that innate ability to be able to compete at the elite level,” he explains.
The problem, though, is where to draw the line between a testosterone advantage and other natural, genetic advantages.
, The author of Sporting Gender, Joanna Harper argues: “If you’re going to pick one advantage to separate the two categories [female and male], you want to pick an advantage that one group has that the other doesn’t. And you pick a biomarker that is widely divergent in the two groups.”
There had to be a line of demarcation at some point, and unfortunately Mboma and Masilingi were on the wrong side.
Harper, a transgender athlete herself, says: “It’s not an elegant solution by any stretch of the imagination, but it places fairly minimal restrictions on people… It’s not elegant, but it’s not, to my mind, horribly unreasonable either.”
Kenyan runner Margaret Wambui says athletics needs a third category beyond men and women.
World Athletics does not attempt to argue that Mboma and Masilingi, and other female athletes with high testosterone levels, are not women.
“We are committed to fairness for women in sport and reject any allegation that biological limits in the female category are based on race or gender stereotypes,” they told Tidesports source in a written statement.
“On the contrary, they provide an objective and scientific measure to define the female category, and are a necessary, reasonable and proportionate means of attaining what both the Court of Arbitration for Sport and the Swiss Federation Tribunal agreed was a legitimate objective.”
But for these two teenagers, a legal ruling on their womanhood is very personal.
“We all come from different areas and are raised differently. It’s just different. We are all created differently, with different purposes. So you can’t compare me with someone else. It’s really unfair,” says Masilingi.
As of now, the young women are not going to take legal action against World Athletics, but they will fight for their right to race.
“We won’t be quiet,” Masilingi concludes. “I’ll say the support system is very strong at the moment. There is a lot of it going on… It’s all over the world and seeing people against this rule and everything, which really means a lot. The love, the coaches, and everyone, it’s just good.”
Nigeria has launched a nationwide grassroots flag football development initiative in partnership with the National Football League (NFL) and Browns Nigeria as part of efforts to promote youth development and expand participation in the sport across the country.
The programme, tagged “One Ball. One Flag. One Future,” is being spearheaded by the Nigeria American Football Association (NAFA) and will be officially unveiled in Lagos on Wednesday.
According to NAFA, the initiative will involve the distribution of 2,000 footballs and 5,000 flag kits to schools, educational institutions and community organisations nationwide to increase access to flag football and establish a structured pathway for youth development through sports.
NAFA described the rollout as a major milestone in building a sustainable American football ecosystem in Nigeria, where the sport is still at a developmental stage compared to football and basketball.
The association said the programme extends beyond equipment distribution and is aimed at fostering leadership, discipline, teamwork, confidence and resilience among young Nigerians.
Speaking on the initiative, NAFA Chief Executive Officer and Founder, Babajide Akeredolu, said the programme is designed to create opportunities for young people across the country.
“‘One Ball. One Flag. One Future’ is about more than equipment distribution. It is about access. It is about possibility. It is about ensuring that a child in any community across Nigeria can discover a sport that teaches leadership, teamwork, discipline, confidence and resilience,” he said.
Flag football, a non-contact version of American football, has witnessed growing global popularity and is set to make its Olympic debut at the 2028 Los Angeles Games, a development that has boosted international investment in youth-focused programmes.
NAFA said the initiative would serve as the foundation for long-term development programmes at primary, secondary and tertiary education levels.
The association outlined several participation pathways, including the K-12 Flag Football Development Programme, the Nigeria Secondary School Flag Football League (NSSFFL), and the Nigeria Collegiate Flag Football League (NCFFL).
The programme also features the Gridiron Gems Girls Development Initiative, which aims to increase female participation in the sport, alongside talent identification and athlete development schemes.
According to NAFA, the objective is to create a sustainable ecosystem for athletes, coaches and officials while integrating flag football into Nigeria’s educational and community structures.
The launch event is expected to attract government officials, sports administrators, education stakeholders, youth leaders and development partners.
Organisers said the partnership with the NFL and Browns Nigeria reflects a broader strategy to expand flag football across Africa through grassroots investment, institutional collaboration and structured development programmes.
They added that the initiative is expected to strengthen youth engagement in sports while creating new opportunities for leadership development and community participation nationwide.
When completed, the Warri City Stadium, which is being re-modelled by the Delta State government might “compel” some African countries to use it in prosecuting their CAF and continental matches soon, so says the contractor handling the project, Olanrewaju Adeleke.
The stadium is expected to be completed in September this year.
Speaking with The Guardian, yesterday, Adeleke, who is the Managing Director of Peculiar Consults, stated that
apart from an upgraded FIFA-standard hybrid grass surface and complete underground drainage system, the Warri Stadium is also designed with an advanced nine-lane tartan track (World Athletics standard), an Olympic-sized swimming pool, and a brand new indoor sports hall. There are also a basketball court, volleyball court, tennis court, and two dedicated practice pitches.
Other features in the new Warri stadium include advanced security and surveillance systems covering the interior and surrounding areas.
“Going by the work we have done so far, I am sure the stadium will be ready by September this year,” Adeleke said. “And it will be the new sports destination for many African countries because of the quality of both the playing turf, which is of FIFA standard, and other aspects of the complex. We have some West African countries playing their CAF and continental matches in far away Morocco and South Africa. But all that will change when we complete this Warri City Stadium.”
Adeleke said that the stadium’s playing turf, which used to be waterlogged, has been ‘raised’ to three layers.
“As we speak, it rains on daily basis here in Warri, but you won’t see a single drop of water on the pitch because of the concrete job we did underneath. Presently, the playing turf is on three layers, and it was done to FIFA specification. The dream of Delta State Government is to elevate Warri Stadium to world-class standard and that is what we have done,” he said.
The new stadium complex, which will see the capacity increased from 17,000 to 20,000 spectators, will feature an upgraded, FIFA-standard hybrid grass surface and a complete overhaul of underground drainage systems.
Adeleke said: “As a contractor, we allow our jobs to speak for us. The Warri Stadium is the first we have done in Nigeria. We are also handling the re-grassing of Teslim Balogun Stadium in Lagos, and we have secured the contract to handle two stadia in Bayelsa State. We might also re-grass the Stephen Keshi Stadium in Asaba. By the time we complete these five stadia, Nigeria will be moving close to countries like Morocco and South Africa in terms of stadia with FIFA-standard hybrid grass surface.”
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