Sports
Local players enjoy challenges, concentration golf requires
Lambda Links members rediscovered sport after settling in D.C.
Paul Sliwka, on left, and Amy Powell, members of Lambda Links. (Photos courtesy the subjects)
Golf takes the spotlight this week in the ongoing Washington Blade All Star series. Two LGBT players from Lambda Links share their path to the sport of golf.
Paul Sliwka had a golf course near his home in upstate New York as a youth and he occasionally snuck in with his brother to hit golf balls. Organized sports came in the way of little league baseball and peewee football.
As a high schooler, he was a school record holder in the pole vault. Originally from Washington, he returned to the area to attend Georgetown University.
Sliwka started his own business in 2011, Central Properties, and made sure he left room in his schedule for outside activities. He began with golf lessons at Langston Golf Course and eventually signed up with Lambda Links.
“It’s nice to have a regular golf date with folks that are nonjudgmental and interesting. It forced me to become a better golfer,” Sliwka says. “The Links offered a way of playing golf that I hadn’t experienced before. They are extremely welcoming of beginners and they worked with me. It was a soft landing.”
Now an avid golfer who is competing in tournaments, Sliwka weaves in his other hobbies, skiing and art collecting, on his travels. He calls it “traveling with a purpose.”
“In life as in golf, if you keep your head down and keep grinding, good things will happen,” Sliwka says. “I love to compete and it is necessary to be patient in this sport. The first putt and the last putt are both important.”
Sliwka also competes in tournaments with the Maryland State Golf Association and played earlier this year with Stonewall Golfers in Palm Springs. Last month he won a bronze medal at the Gay Games in Paris. Coming up for him this month are the Lambda Links club championships at Twin Lakes Golf Course.
“Lambda Links is a great mix of people, men and women of all ages,” Sliwka says. “Competing in your sport makes you understand what you need. Golf for me is relaxing, lifts my spirits and makes me happy.”
Amy Powell needed a gym credit while attending William & Mary and chose golf. She didn’t think about the sport again until years later when a friend needed a golf partner. She found herself hooked.
Born in Roanoke, Va., Powell grew up a tennis player. She played on her high school team and was a walk-on at William & Mary. After completing grad school at the University of Vermont, she moved to D.C. in 1999. She bowled with the Capital Area Rainbowlers Association and the following year signed up with Lambda Links.
“Lambda Links has players of all levels and the league is a good way to get started in the sport,” Powell says. “I like having a built in social event along with a guaranteed tee time.”
Powell, who works at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, refers to herself as an achiever type and likes that there are multiple levels of challenges in golf.
“Golf is the hardest sport I have ever tried,” Powell says. “You can measure yourself in different ways; against the course, against your last round.”
Working her way through the sport, Powell played in a few Pro-Ams until a back injury knocked her out two years ago. This year marked her return to Lambda Links.
“It’s been great to see folks again and reconnect. That two-year period was like an extended winter,” she says. “Lambda Links is a healthy balance between people who want to compete and people who want to learn the sport.”
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.
The Olympics will end on Sunday.
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