Sports
Road to the Gay Games
Out athlete was late bloomer in swimming
Lindsey Warren-Shriner says the daily routine of swimming has been a good discipline for her. (Photo by Kevin Majoros)
This week in the continuing series on the LGBT athletes of Washington who will be competing at the 2014 Cleveland/Akron Gay Games, we visit with swimmer Lindsey Warren-Shriner of the District of Columbia Aquatics Club.
Warren-Shriner was recently awarded the Rick Meier Windes Memorial Award in recognition of excellence in distance swimming for her performance at the International Gay & Lesbian Aquatics Championships in Seattle in 2013.
WASHINGTON BLADE: What is your swimming background?
LINDSEY WARREN-SHRINER: I took an introduction to competitive swimming class during the fall of my (high school) freshman year to fulfill my P.E. requirement and tried out for the varsity swim team that winter and didn’t make it. I took the class again during the fall of my sophomore year and made the team that winter.
That first year, I was one of the slowest swimmers and didn’t even compete with the team at championships. By my senior year, I had started to focus on distance events and dropped more than 30 seconds from my 500-yard freestyle time in one season. That led to me talking to swim coaches as I visited colleges, which was not something I would have expected even a year earlier.
I went on to swim for Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania for two years and then transferred to Bowdoin College in Maine, in part because they had a phenomenal swim program. I have been swimming with DCAC since I graduated and moved to D.C. almost four years ago, and I have also done several triathlons and open water races.
BLADE: Did you play any other sports growing up?
WARREN-SHRINER: I did a lot — soccer, basketball, softball and tennis — and was really bad at all of them. I definitely wasn’t great when I started swimming either, but I liked it from the beginning and was more motivated to get better than I had been with any other sport.
BLADE: What events will you compete in at the Gay Games?
WARREN-SHRINER: I’ll be doing all of the distance events — the 200-, 400-, 800- and 1,500-meter freestyle events and the 400-meter individual medley.
BLADE: What will your training regimen consist of leading up to the Gay Games?
WARREN-SHRINER: I usually go to six or seven DCAC practices a week. I don’t really like going to the gym so I stick with swimming. We practice for an hour and a half and I usually end up swimming almost 4,000 yards a day. We also have one night a week where we have a distance-oriented workout which is good preparation for the events I swim.
BLADE: What is it about swimming that keeps you in the sport?
WARREN-SHRINER: Since I started swimming competitively much later than most of my college teammates, I wasn’t ready to stop swimming when I graduated. I found a great team in DCAC that has motivated me to keep swimming in the almost four years that I have been living here. All of my closest friends in D.C. are swimmers and I love to still have the routine of going to practice every day. While I was fortunate to have had incredibly supportive teammates and coaches as an out athlete in college, being on an LGBT team and a part of that community here has definitely kept me in the sport of swimming as well.
BLADE: Any embarrassing swimming stories to share?
WARREN-SHRINER: At the conference championships in my junior year of college, each team had a few high-tech racing suits that got passed around for each of the swimmer’s best events. The suits were extremely tight and impossible to put on without help.
When it was time for me to put the suit on before I swam the 1,650-yard freestyle, my teammates put plastic bags around my feet to get the suit over my ankles, and four of my teammates literally pulled the suit up my legs half an inch at a time while I stood, not helping at all, in the locker room. It was completely ridiculous but I ended up having a great race!
BLADE: Have you been to the Gay Games? What are you most looking forward to at the Gay Games?
WARREN-SHRINER: I have never been to the Gay Games, but I have gone to two IGLA championships with DCAC. I love traveling and competing with the team and I am particularly excited for the Gay Games since it is so much bigger than IGLA. I am very excited to be competing at such a big event for LGBT athletes and representing one of the largest LGBT swim teams in the world.
Sports
New IOC policy bans trans women from Olympics
New regulation to be in effect at 2028 summer games in Los Angeles
The International Olympic Committee on Thursday announced it will not allow transgender women from competing in female events at the Olympics.
“For all disciplines on the Sports Program of an IOC event, including individual and team sports, eligibility for any Female Category is limited to biological females,” reads the new policy.
The policy states “eligibility for the Female Category is to be determined in the first instance by SRY Gene screening to detect the absence or presence of the SRY Gene.”
“On the basis of the scientific evidence, the IOC considers that the SRY (sex-determining Region Y) Gene is fixed throughout life and represents highly accurate evidence that an athlete has experienced or will experience male sex development,” it reads. “Furthermore, the IOC considers that SRY Gene screening via saliva, cheek swab or blood sample is unintrusive compared to other possible methods. Athletes who screen negative for the SRY gene permanently satisfy this policy’s eligibility criteria for competition in the Female Category.”
The policy states the test “will be a once-in-a-lifetime test” unless “there is reason to believe a negative reading is in error.”
The new regulation will be in place for the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.
“I understand that this a very sensitive topic,” said IOC President Kirsty Coventry on Thursday in a video. “As a former athlete, I passionately believe in the rights of all Olympians to take part in fair competition.”
“The policy that we have announced is based on science and it has been led by medical experts with the best interests of athletes at its heart. The scientific evidence is very clear: male chromosomes give performance advances in sport that rely on strength, power, or endurance,” she added. “At the Olympic Games, even the smallest margins can be the difference between victory and defeat. So, it is absolutely clear that it would not be fair for biological males to compete in the female category. In addition, in some sports it would simply not be safe.”
(Video courtesy of the IOC)
Laurel Hubbard, a weightlifter from New Zealand, in 2021 became the first trans woman to compete at the Olympics.
Imane Khelif, an Algerian boxer, won a gold medal at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. Khelif later sued JK Rowling and Elon Musk for cyberstalking after they questioned her gender identity.
Ellis Lundholm, a mogul skier from Sweden, this year became the first openly trans athlete to compete in any Winter Olympics when he participated in Milan Cortina Winter Olympics in Italy.
President Donald Trump in February 2025 issued an executive order that bans trans women and girls from female sports teams in the U.S.
The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee last July banned trans women from competing in female sporting events. Republican lawmakers have demanded the IOC ban trans athletes from women’s athletic competitions.
“I’m grateful the Olympics finally embraced the common sense policy that women’s sports are for women, not for men,” said U.S. Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) on X.
An IOC spokesperson on Thursday referred the Washington Blade to the press release that announced the new policy.
More than a dozen LGBTQ athletes won medals at the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics that ended on Sunday.
Cayla Barnes, Hilary Knight, and Alex Carpenter are LGBTQ members of the U.S. women’s hockey team that won a gold medal after they defeated Canada in overtime. Knight the day before the Feb. 19 match proposed to her girlfriend, Brittany Bowe, an Olympic speed skater.
French ice dancer Guillaume Cizeron, who is gay, and his partner Laurence Fournier Beaudry won gold. American alpine skier Breezy Johnson, who is bisexual, won gold in the women’s downhill. Amber Glenn, who identifies as bisexual and pansexual, was part of the American figure skating team that won gold in the team event.
Swiss freestyle skier Mathilde Gremaud, who is in a relationship with Vali Höll, an Austrian mountain biker, won gold in women’s freeski slopestyle.
Bruce Mouat, who is the captain of the British curling team that won a silver medal, is gay. Six members of the Canadian women’s hockey team — Emily Clark, Erin Ambrose, Emerance Maschmeyer, Brianne Jenner, Laura Stacey, and Marie-Philip Poulin — that won silver are LGBTQ.
Swedish freestyle skier Sandra Naeslund, who is a lesbian, won a bronze medal in ski cross.
Belgian speed skater Tineke den Dulk, who is bisexual, was part of her country’s mixed 2000-meter relay that won bronze. Canadian ice dancer Paul Poirier, who is gay, and his partner, Piper Gilles, won bronze.
Laura Zimmermann, who is queer, is a member of the Swiss women’s hockey team that won bronze when they defeated Sweden.
Outsports.com notes all of the LGBTQ Olympians who competed at the games and who medaled.
Sports
US wins Olympic gold medal in women’s hockey
Team captain Hilary Knight proposed to girlfriend on Wednesday
The U.S. women’s hockey team on Thursday won a gold medal at the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics.
Team USA defeated Canada 2-1 in overtime. The game took place a day after Team USA captain Hilary Knight proposed to her girlfriend, Brittany Bowe, an Olympic speed skater.
Cayla Barnes and Alex Carpenter — Knight’s teammates — are also LGBTQ. They are among the more than 40 openly LGBTQ athletes who are competing in the games.
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