A lot has happened since January 29. That day, Halba Diouf, a transgender athlete, won the 200 m Indoor Regionals in Miramas (Bouches-du-Rhône), after having already performed the day before over 60 m (23”45 and 7” 36 as references), enough to allow him to see big for the French U23 and Elite Championships, a few weeks later.
However, a few days before the national meeting, the athlete, who made her gender transition as soon as she came of age (she is 21 today), was erased from the lists of participants, the French Athletics Federation ( FFA) wanting more information on his biological follow-up, knowing that at the time, World Athletics (WA) required a testosterone level of less than 5 nmol/l over a period of one year.
Halba Diouf met these criteria and a commission created in the wake of the FFA was to rule on his case. Except that at the end of March, WA announced the ban on competitions for transgender athletes (women who had had male puberty). “Shocked”Diouf told us in a long interview that it was ” a fight “ and she was going “to appear in competitions”.
Winner of the 200m in 22”67 (+2.0 m/s), Halba Diouf broke her personal best and achieved a top performance (very close to the minima for the Olympics, 22”57) which would make she is the ninth best French performer in history on the U-turn. But, as the FFA told us, his performances cannot be taken into account for a selection or for records.
However, as announced, the Frenchwoman wishes to continue to move forward despite the last very dense weeks, between her student life and her new status which has seen her appear in several media to tell her story.