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Transgender high school student stars on female track team: ‘I do hope I inspire people’
Connecticut high school is allowing a 15-year-old transgender student who identifies as a girl to run on its female track team.
Coaches at Cromwell High School are thrilled with freshman Andraya Yearwood, whose speed compared to biological girls makes the student a star. Andraya clocked times of 11.99 seconds and 26.34 seconds in the 100- and 200-meter dashes, respectively, during the first meet of the season. Both times resulted in a first-place win.
“I have a spectacular female athlete,” coach Brian Calhoun told the Hartford Courant. “There’s nothing more to say. To approach it in any other way might create some sort of issue or conversation.”
Andraya told the newspaper she hopes to “inspire people, but not only with track.”
“I hope it inspires people to not hold yourself back just because you’re scared of it or it is your first time doing it, or because of other people’s negativity,” she said.
The student’s mother, Ngozi Nnaji, said critics should stop focusing on her child’s biology while watching races or reading about the results.
Coaches at Cromwell High School are thrilled with freshman Andraya Yearwood, whose speed compared to biological girls makes the student a star. Andraya clocked times of 11.99 seconds and 26.34 seconds in the 100- and 200-meter dashes, respectively, during the first meet of the season. Both times resulted in a first-place win.
“I have a spectacular female athlete,” coach Brian Calhoun told the Hartford Courant. “There’s nothing more to say. To approach it in any other way might create some sort of issue or conversation.”
Andraya told the newspaper she hopes to “inspire people, but not only with track.”
“I hope it inspires people to not hold yourself back just because you’re scared of it or it is your first time doing it, or because of other people’s negativity,” she said.
The student’s mother, Ngozi Nnaji, said critics should stop focusing on her child’s biology while watching races or reading about the results.
As the competitors settled into their blocks Tuesday for the 100-meter girls final at the CIAC Class M track meet — one sprinter clearly more powerfully built than the others — the question could not be ignored.
As that same powerfully built sprinter overtook the field in the final 70 meters of the 200 finals, the question remained.
And as Stonington junior Kate Hall, who had won the Class M 100 last year, brushed back tears after she had finished second behind transgender female Andraya Yearwood of Cromwell in the 100, this much was clear:
The question that could not be ignored has no easy, painless answer.
As that same powerfully built sprinter overtook the field in the final 70 meters of the 200 finals, the question remained.
And as Stonington junior Kate Hall, who had won the Class M 100 last year, brushed back tears after she had finished second behind transgender female Andraya Yearwood of Cromwell in the 100, this much was clear:
The question that could not be ignored has no easy, painless answer.
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