She was neither. Semenya, born and raised as a girl, is believed to be intersex, external – identifying as a woman, but with physical characteristics typically associated with both men and women.
No-one knows for certain. In Berlin, on only her second trip outside of her homeland, an innocent abroad overwhelmed by the world’s sudden fascination, she said nothing.
She has made no public comment since, and neither have officials, so we are left with what she was diagnosed with – hyperandrogenism, her testosterone levels far in excess of the vast majority of women.
Since testosterone is the principal male sex hormone, promoting among other physical effects muscle mass and strength, the IAAF decided post-Berlin that an intersex athlete with the condition had an unfair advantage over the rest of the competition. , external
And so, four years ago, it established a threshold above which such athletes could not compete in women’s events: roughly three times higher levels of testosterone than that naturally occurring in 99% of female athletes.