A Coach’s Response to USACs Transgender Participation Policy

To the Board of Directors and Leadership of USA Climbing,

Disappointed is an understatement. Furious would be putting it mildly. 

When I read USA Climbing's announcement of their new transgender athlete participation policy I felt crushed. For the climbing community, for myself, and for the athletes of the sport I love — I am heartbroken. As a trans climber, guide, educator, local climbing organization board president, and (because of this decision a now former) USAC coach, I want to share with you my perspective as it is clear to me that you listened to no trans athletes, coaches, or parents in your decision to enact these changes. 

In your announcement you state that, “USA Climbing’s participation policy changes are not unique.” And you’re right. It has been a trend in the past few years to create policies similar to yours. However, you fail to mention the ways these policies have been deeply criticized, fiercely detested, and harmful to trans athletes. Pointing to other sports harming trans athletes as your influence and as precedence is not the compelling argument you think it is. 

I also feel the need to include how demeaning it feels to even have to write this. As context, for the past year I’ve watched my trans siblings bear their souls and beg through tears in legislative houses, opinion articles, and in open letters just like this one. In 2023 alone, nearly 600 anti-trans bills have been introduced across 49 states. That is the trend you are now a part of. 

Perhaps the saddest part of letters like this is that they are too often someone’s first exposure to a trans perspective. Instead of pure and unbridled joy and self-love – what has been central to my journey as a trans climber – I must now introduce myself with anger and disappointment. 

Before I delve into the harms of your policy I will address the concept that is always used to justify these policies — fairness. 

The most glaring issue with fairness when considering exclusionary policies like yours are the litany of ways in which athletic governing bodies are indifferent to other examples of unfair competition standards. 

Access to professional trainers and coaches, sports physicians, physical therapists, modern climbing gyms, and workout equipment have a huge impact in determining athletic success. As competition setting has shifted to problems that cater to audience appeal with dynamic and gymnastic movement, I’ve watched countless examples of climbers from small gyms getting shut down on terrain they have no opportunity to train for because their gym can’t prepare them for it. Last weekend I watched a kid bring a $200 battery powered fan to a comp to dry their hands.

When a gym sends a large team to a qualifying competition and there are problems reused for different classes I watch athletes give exact and specific beta to their teammates between sessions while kids from smaller gyms are forced to spend their time and energy unlocking it. Is this fair? 

Since arguments against trans inclusion in sports seem to focus on biology, let’s look at the ways biological differences impact our sport already. 

Hand size, shin length, height, and ape index are all biological differences in climbers. I’ve watched kids in competitions get shut down because they couldn’t fully grasp a pinch or fit into a knee bar. Just yesterday I watched in a qualifying comp as five kids failed on the last move of a climb they had no hope of reaching. If it’s something USAC is worried about, why are there not additional holds that only climbers under a certain height can use or other means to address this difference in biological ability? 

The point is, climbing is already a deeply subjective sport to compete in. There are advantages and disadvantages we can’t change, and those we don’t even try to. One of the beauties of our sport is finding ways to succeed with the different bodies we have. And if you’re thinking to yourself, “well, a person can’t help it if they have big hands.” You’re right. I urge you to use that logic when considering inclusion of trans climbers. 

A properly trans-inclusive sport would be one that sees trans climbers as a part of the game and an asset to our sport. Instead, our efforts to participate authentically in a sport we love are seen as ill-intentioned or cheating the system for personal gain. Which brings me to address the most important elephant in the room when we talk about trans people and hormone levels. 

The focus of every major sport’s trans athlete policies all really boil down to one thing — testosterone. If you are a cis person, your reaction may be: “Well testosterone levels do impact climbing ability; we need to draw the line somewhere, don’t we?” 

First of all, we don’t. But this is not the place for that conversation. Rather, I ask only that we acknowledge what trans people feel whenever we get to this point in the conversation: When you say that in order to compete in a women’s category, trans women and trans girls must adhere to a testosterone level threshold, you echo the sentiment that trans women with more testosterone in their body are not categorically women in the eyes of your organization. 

The inevitable side effect of a testosterone level-based competition standard is that it upholds a particularly volatile talking point used to harm trans people. That we cannot be who we are because of our biology. I say this not to argue for the elimination of testosterone level requirements, although I could. But in hopes you will at the very least take notice, because I have never heard a governing body of a sports organization even acknowledge it. We are not cheating, we are existing. Help us do so in your sport. 

I should mention this is all aside from the fact that cis women very commonly have naturally occurring testosterone levels above those allowed for trans women in sports, and note that your claim that, “the topic of transgender athlete participation has been studied and debated extensively by national and international sports organizations in recent years,” is baseless and misleading. You left out the fact that the science itself is contested and inconclusive, often using singular physical tests like push ups that ignore psychological and emotional variables that must be included to properly study impact in competition conditions, and that authors caution their use to influence participation policies. 

There is no evidence suggesting that any single biological factor such as testosterone will determine success in competition conditions above all other variables. There have also been no studies on hormone replacement therapy and climbing performance. 

And yet, with all that being said, we can actually find compromise. I will speak for myself and say that I actually would be willing to agree to testosterone reporting as an imperfect, but workable policy. The issue is that it’s never just about hormones. 

If you hear nothing else I say in this letter I urge you to understand the following: The now required US Anti-Doping Agency’s Therapeutic Use Exception (USADA TUE) requirements for transgender athletes are humiliating, demeaning, harmful, and irrelevant to what your own policy aims to accomplish. 

Let’s assume I completely agreed with testosterone level testing as a necessary metric for determining fair competition categories. When you look at the USADA TUE Requirements, the majority of them don’t address issues of performance or testosterone or biology at all, and instead focus on making trans athletes justify and prove the validity of their transition. 

To name a few: 

“A psychological record and/or consultation notes establishing the diagnosis of Gender Dysphoria made by a psychiatrist or psychologist addressing the criteria set forth in the most recent version of the DSM or ICD” 

This does nothing to address or ensure fairness, and supports the pervasive and transphobic notion that we don’t or can’t understand or the validity of our own identity. It seeks to make us prove to you that we have a good reason for our treatment, while failing to give you any information about how our treatment connects to our climbing. It is also otherwise confidential and one of many parts of our private personal life that you have no right to ask about. 

Additionally, the assertion here is that someone would lie about their diagnosis and undergo extensive hormone replacement therapy to lower their testosterone levels in order to compete in women’s sports. I can hardly begin to explain how absurd this claim is and anyone who knows a trans person who has gone through this process will know how insulting it is. 

“Complete medical history that details the diagnosis according to current WPATH Standards of Care for the Health of Transsexual, Transgender, and Gender Nonconforming People Guidelines & current US Endocrine Society’s Clinical Practice Guidelines for Gender-Dysphoric/Gender-Incongruent Persons.” 

Unless your staff is qualified to understand the intricacies of my medical history and diagnosis, of what value would this be to USA Climbing? Do you have doctors trained in gender affirming care who can interpret this information? And if you do, in what way does knowing my medical history seek to increase fairness in competition and how will you use my medical history to determine its impact on my performance? In short, why do you need to know this and what are you doing with this information that will lead to fairer competition standards? 

“An endocrinologist’s report of initiation of hormone therapy and subsequent hormone treatments.” 

What value does this add beyond hormone concentration level reports? Why do you need this report to achieve your goal of a fair competition standard? Additionally, many of us don’t see an endocrinologist because it is not necessary. This adds yet another expensive barrier to accessing competition. 

“A statement from the treating physician detailing an ongoing treatment plan.” 

Again, why do you need to know and what staff do you have to interpret the validity, relevance, or importance of a treatment plan that is in all other cases a highly personal and confidential plan between me and my doctor? 

“Complete record of all prescriptions (dose/route/frequency) related to the diagnosis.” 

Are cis athletes required to report prescriptions for medically necessary treatments? With blood tests to tell you what my hormone levels are, why do you need to know my prescription dosages and frequencies that vary widely depending on the person? And what right do you have to know any other prescriptions we’re taking?

“A letter written by the athlete describing their personal experience and decision to undergo their medical transition.” 

Here we have what might be the most painfully ignorant and harmful requirements of any. First, there can be no argument made that this adds to your understanding of the impact of my medical transition on my climbing. Secondly, it can cause harm. You’re asking us to revisit and recount potential trauma and highly personal details of our lives. To require someone to describe their decision to undergo medical transition is reprehensible. And I can again think of no reason to require this letter beyond asking trans athletes to defend our validity as people. 

“Medical note and/or surgery report documenting sex reassignment surgery, if applicable.” 

I dare you to tell me what relevance this could have on my ability to compete. Why do you insist on knowing the personal details of our bodies and what gives you the right to think you deserve access to this information that is irrelevant to my ability to compete fairly? Show me the study that compares gender affirming surgeries to athletic performance. If you can’t tell me how a surgery impacts my climbing then you have no right to ask for details about it. Why do you need to know whether I’ve had my testicles removed and exactly how do you think it gives me an advantage in climbing? And if you’re someone who is reading this and thinking to yourself, “Well I’m not sure that had to be included,” you are only just scratching the surface of how uncomfortable it can be to be a trans athlete. 

It is genuinely difficult to condense the ways these changes hurt trans climbers into written words that are digestible in a single letter. None of this addresses the fact that these requirements cost thousands of dollars a year for trans climbers, your timelines for testing and reporting are unrealistic and out of touch with trans healthcare, that you are now barring climbers whose state laws prevent them from meeting your requirements, that your policies hold no acknowledgement for the ways being a trans athlete is uniquely difficult, or that you’ve given no explanation of how you plan to keep any of this medical information safe or confidential – something I know from personal sources you have failed at in the past. 

I will end where I started: with community. 

You had the chance to invite us to sit shoulder to shoulder to imagine the ways trans climbers can help our sport flourish. You had the opportunity to show the world how the climbing community is different. And you failed. 

You claim these policies came, “after consultation with various USA Climbing stakeholders…” This is a lie. Not a single coach, athlete, or parent I know heard anything of these changes until they were announced – an announcement made at the bottom of a single email with no press release. Are you not proud of these changes you claim to make in the name of fairness? You voted on these changes unanimously but they aren’t even a news line on your website. It’s shameful. Several committee and connected individuals have spoken out to say that you continuously ignored voices of opposition - notably trans voices.

Being trans in 2023 is hard. USA Climbing has decided they are comfortable making it harder. I will not be a part of it. 

To the gym owners, setters, gym staff, parents, coaches, athletes, and event sponsors who may read this: end participation in, and support of USAC events. Show the USAC that you will not help or host events that use these policies. 

Your transgender athlete participation policies are harmful to trans climbers. They are reductive and ignorant of the trans experience. They are painful and humiliating. They are invasive and inappropriate, and irrelevant even to the inconclusive science you claim to use as your guide. Furthermore, the process you’ve chosen in creating and announcing these changes to our sport is wholly incompatible to the community I love. Instead of seizing the opportunity to bring our community together you have destroyed any hope I had that trans climbers will feel included at USA Climbing’s table. 

I have twice coached youth to nationals. Until now I believed that I would certainly do so again. However, it is without question or hesitation that the adoption of these changes mark the end of my involvement with USA Climbing. I will not renew my coaching membership and I will not coach under these rules. It is with bottomless disappointment, grief, and emptiness that I leave the world of coaching at this level of competition. Nothing USAC has ever done has made me feel more misunderstood or unwelcome at your events and in this community. 

Kristen Fiore,
Climbing Coach 
CRAG-VT President 
AMGA SPI