Sports
Rookies & Vets: Washington Scandals
Local gay rugby league kicks off new season in August
Vinny Ah Sam says learning rugby was intimidating at first. (Photo by Zack Kreiter)
This week in the Washington Blade series on the rookie and veteran players that compete on the LGBT sports teams in the D.C. area, we focus on two gay athletes from the Washington Scandals rugby team.
The Scandals were formed in 2013 when overcrowding on other local rugby teams was preventing interested players from competing in the sport. They are not playing in a league and have created a niche lining up games with teams from the Eastern seaboard and competing in tournaments.
They are currently between seasons and going through conditioning training. Their first rookie camp session for the new season will be held on Aug. 15.
Vinny Ah Sam joined the team in May after Scandals president Sean Cunningham invited him to see what the team was all about.
“I got there for my first practice and was really intimidated,” Ah Sam says. “I had never played a full-contact sport and they were really scary.”
Ah Sam grew up in El Sobrante, Calif., and played multiple sports growing up including baseball and basketball. His main sport from age 10 on was swimming and he swam for two years at Diablo Valley College.
He moved to D.C. when his fiancé Zach took a job here in 2013 and he is currently taking classes to earn a degree in surgical technology at Montgomery College and working as a lifeguard and swim instructor.
Ah Sam learned the basics of rugby playing on the beach in California with his college swim team and that experience set him up for a quick integration into the sport.
“Actually competing in the sport is a whole new experience for me and I absolutely love it,” Ah Sam says. “The veterans have been pushing me to be the best that I can be.”
Another plus for Ah Sam is his background in sports medicine and athletic training which allows him to be involved in occasionally setting up workouts and treating injured teammates.
“I really like the whole experience of being a part of this team,” Ah Sam says. “During a match, I feel really useful when I take someone down and defend the try zone.”
Brendan Raden had a friend on the Scandals when they formed in early 2013 and joined the team in July, 2013.
“People have this idea of what rugby is and then that idea just sits in their mind until they actually play,” Raden says. “Even though I had never played, I loved it immediately.”
Raden grew up in Rockville and Damascus, Md., and attended college at the University of Delaware. Growing up he played baseball and lacrosse but didn’t compete in college.
“I played volleyball and ultimate Frisbee recreationally and refereed for intramurals,” Raden says. “Sports were not a priority for me then and I regret that now.”
Raden is currently a full-time student at University of Maryland working toward two more degrees, English literature and secondary English education. This time he is also deeply involved in his sport.
Brendan Raden says he’s always excited to see new Scandals members. (Photo courtesy Raden)
By the end of 2013 he was the captain of the team and has also been the coach of the team since 2014 after getting his coach’s certification.
“That was frightening since I had only been playing for just over a year,” Raden says.
Raden jumped right into the leadership role and realized that they were constantly teaching the basics over and over. The team subsequently created a rookie camp to help beginners learn the sport.
“Most other teams have a one-time rookie 101 day clinic where they go over the basics. It is detached and without context,” Raden says. “We have three rookie camps where the veterans come in to play with the rookies and go over the scenarios. It is a no-pressure, comfortable environment.”
Raden says rookies are everything for the team.
“You need the numbers to keep the team going and to keep improving. Whenever I see a new player, I say to myself, ‘Ah yes, here is somebody new. Fantastic.’”
Coming up for the fall season, the Scandals have four-to-five confirmed matches lined up and tournaments in Charlotte and Atlanta.
“I didn’t join this team to find friends. I just wanted to play a really cool sport,” Raden says. “It turned out that the guys on the team are my closest friends. It has been pretty incredible.”
Sports
Attitude! French ice dancers nail ‘Vogue’ routine
Cizeron and Fournier Beaudry strike a pose in memorable Olympics performance
Madonna’s presence is being felt at the Olympic Games in Italy.
Guillaume Cizeron and his rhythm ice dancing partner Laurence Fournier Beaudry of France performed a flawless skate to Madonna’s “Vogue” and “Rescue Me” on Monday.
The duo scored an impressive 90.18 for their effort, the best score of the night.
“We’ve been working hard the whole season to get over 90, so it was nice to see the score on the screen,” Fournier Beaudry told Olympics.com. “But first of all, just coming out off the ice, we were very happy about what we delivered and the pleasure we had out there. With the energy of the crowd, it was really amazing.”
Watch the routine on YouTube here.
Italy
Olympics Pride House ‘really important for the community’
Italy lags behind other European countries in terms of LGBTQ rights
The four Italian advocacy groups behind the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics’ Pride House hope to use the games to highlight the lack of LGBTQ rights in their country.
Arcigay, CIG Arcigay Milano, Milano Pride, and Pride Sport Milano organized the Pride House that is located in Milan’s MEET Digital Culture Center. The Washington Blade on Feb. 5 interviewed Pride House Project Manager Joseph Naklé.
Naklé in 2020 founded Peacox Basket Milano, Italy’s only LGBTQ basketball team. He also carried the Olympic torch through Milan shortly before he spoke with the Blade. (“Heated Rivalry” stars Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie last month participated in the torch relay in Feltre, a town in Italy’s Veneto region.)
Naklé said the promotion of LGBTQ rights in Italy is “actually our main objective.”
ILGA-Europe in its Rainbow Map 2025 notes same-sex couples lack full marriage rights in Italy, and the country’s hate crimes law does not include sexual orientation or gender identity. Italy does ban discrimination based on sexual orientation in employment, but the country’s nondiscrimination laws do not include gender identity.
ILGA-Europe has made the following recommendations “in order to improve the legal and policy situation of LGBTI people in Italy.”
• Marriage equality for same-sex couples
• Depathologization of trans identities
• Automatic co-parent recognition available for all couples
“We are not really known to be the most openly LGBT-friendly country,” Naklé told the Blade. “That’s why it (Pride House) was really important for the community.”
“We want to use the Olympic games — because there is a big media attention — and we want to use this media attention to raise the voice,” he added.
Naklé noted Pride House will host “talks and roundtables every night” during the games that will focus on a variety of topics that include transgender and nonbinary people in sports and AI. Another will focus on what Naklé described to the Blade as “the importance of political movements now to fight for our rights, especially in places such as Italy or the U.S. where we are going backwards, and not forwards.”
Seven LGBTQ Olympians — Italian swimmer Alex Di Giorgio, Canadian ice dancers Paul Poirier and Kaitlyn Weaver, Canadian figure skater Eric Radford, Spanish figure skater Javier Raya, Scottish ice dancer Lewis Gibson, and Irish field hockey and cricket player Nikki Symmons — are scheduled to participate in Pride House’s Out and Proud event on Feb. 14.
Pride House Los Angeles – West Hollywood representatives are expected to speak at Pride House on Feb. 21.
The event will include a screening of Mariano Furlani’s documentary about Pride House and LGBTQ inclusion in sports. The MiX International LGBTQ+ Film and Queer Culture Festival will screen later this year in Milan. Pride House Los Angeles – West Hollywood is also planning to show the film during the 2028 Summer Olympics.
Naklé also noted Pride House has launched an initiative that allows LGBTQ sports teams to partner with teams whose members are either migrants from African and Islamic countries or people with disabilities.
“The objective is to show that sports is the bridge between these communities,” he said.
Bisexual US skier wins gold
Naklé spoke with the Blade a day before the games opened. The Milan Cortina Winter Olympics will close on Feb. 22.
More than 40 openly LGBTQ athletes are competing in the games.
Breezy Johnson, an American alpine skier who identifies as bisexual, on Sunday won a gold medal in the women’s downhill. Amber Glenn, who identifies as bisexual and pansexual, on the same day helped the U.S. win a gold medal in team figure skating.
Glenn said she received threats on social media after she told reporters during a pre-Olympics press conference that LGBTQ Americans are having a “hard time” with the Trump-Vance administration in the White House. The Associated Press notes Glenn wore a Pride pin on her jacket during Sunday’s medal ceremony.
“I was disappointed because I’ve never had so many people wish me harm before, just for being me and speaking about being decent — human rights and decency,” said Glenn, according to the AP. “So that was really disappointing, and I do think it kind of lowered that excitement for this.”
Puerto Rico
Bad Bunny shares Super Bowl stage with Ricky Martin, Lady Gaga
Puerto Rican activist celebrates half time show
Bad Bunny on Sunday shared the stage with Ricky Martin and Lady Gaga at the Super Bowl halftime show in Santa Clara, Calif.
Martin came out as gay in 2010. Gaga, who headlined the 2017 Super Bowl halftime show, is bisexual. Bad Bunny has championed LGBTQ rights in his native Puerto Rico and elsewhere.
“Not only was a sophisticated political statement, but it was a celebration of who we are as Puerto Ricans,” Pedro Julio Serrano, president of the LGBTQ+ Federation of Puerto Rico, told the Washington Blade on Monday. “That includes us as LGBTQ+ people by including a ground-breaking superstar and legend, Ricky Martin singing an anti-colonial anthem and showcasing Young Miko, an up-and-coming star at La Casita. And, of course, having queer icon Lady Gaga sing salsa was the cherry on the top.”
La Casita is a house that Bad Bunny included in his residency in San Juan, the Puerto Rican capital, last year. He recreated it during the halftime show.
“His performance brought us together as Puerto Ricans, as Latin Americans, as Americans (from the Americas) and as human beings,” said Serrano. “He embraced his own words by showcasing, through his performance, that the ‘only thing more powerful than hate is love.’”
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