A visually impaired female German athlete who is set to compete in the Paralympics against a trans-identified male athlete has expressed concerns about fairness for women and called on international authorities to determine a “clear position” on the issue.
Katrin Müller-Rottgardt, 42, told BILD that while she believes that “everyone should live in everyday life the way they feel comfortable,” she feels that Italian sprinter Valentina Petrillo, a man previously known as Fabrizio who fathered two children, has “advantages” over female athletes on the basis of his sex.
Using feminine pronouns for Petrillo, Müller-Rottgardt said, “I find it difficult in competitive sport. She lived and trained as a man for a long time, so there is a possibility that the physical requirements are different than for someone who was born a woman. She could therefore have advantages.”
Both sprinters compete in the women’s T12 classification, which is designated for athletes with visual impairments, and are likely to compete against each other in the Paris Paralympics 200m. Last year, in the women’s 200m final at the Para Athletics World Championship, Petrillo displaced Müller-Rottgardt to take a bronze medal while she was relegated to fourth place.
Recalling the 2023 race, Müller-Rottgardt remarked, “I came in ahead of her, but because my guide let go of the wristband that connected us too early, we were disqualified. That’s the only reason Valentina got bronze, as she did in the 400 meters.”
Petrillo, now 50, had previously had a career competing against men, winning 11 national titles in the male category.
In 2019, while in his mid-forties, Petrillo began claiming a transgender identity and taking feminizing hormones, and in 2020, first began running in the women’s category, despite his legal identification still classifying his sex as male.
Petrillo has not undergone surgery and can clearly be distinguished by his appearance from the female athletes he races against. However, due to Müller-Rottgardt’s visual impairment, she was not aware that she had been competing against a man until she heard about the situation after the 2023 finals.
“It wasn’t a focus for me at all, because it didn’t affect me. I didn’t even notice it, because I couldn’t see her. It was only after the race that people talked about how she looked very masculine. I can’t judge that,” Müller-Rottgardt told BILD.
Petrillo has been diagnosed with Stargardt disease, a disorder of the eye that causes retinal degeneration over time. As previously reported by Reduxx, Petrillo currently holds 8 women’s running championship titles, and has broken several records previously held by women. In September 2020 at the Italian Paralympics Championship, Petrillo won gold in the 100m, 200m and 400m T12 events and therefore qualified to represent Italy at the Tokyo Olympic Games.
However, the Italian government intervened and barred Petrillo from competing against women with disabilities at the Paralympics in 2021. The International Olympics Committee (IOC) had just announced updates to guidelines for trans-identifying competitors stating that male athletes must keep the levels of their testosterone below 10 nanomoles per liter for at least 12 months in order to participate.
The trans-identified male’s participation in the women’s category has generated significant controversy. Responding to critics earlier this week, Petrillo told Spanish outlet Relevo he was hopeful that “there will be much more affection for me than I can imagine” at the Paris Games. During the 2023 Paralympic Championships, Petrillo had displaced Spanish female athlete Melani Bergés Gámez, who lost out on an opportunity to compete by eight-hundredths of a second.
“I learned to let go of what I can’t control. I am now psychologically stronger than I have been for some time and this is also due to the support of my psychologist. People always criticize, for whatever reason, and that’s why in my case they’re even more likely to do so,” Petrillo said.
Petrillo has been supported in his efforts to compete against women by Italian trans activist organization Gruppo Trans, for which he also acts as a representative. He has spoken for Gruppo Trans on several occasions, and the organization is backing a documentary film about Petrillo’s life.
In addition to partnering with Petrillo to campaign for males in women’s athletics events, Gruppo Trans also discusses “trans adolescents” and offers a variety of “training” programs through their website. Corporate diversity management training, courses for health care workers, and gender identity workshops for teachers are all available, as are lessons for children intended to be provided by instructors at schools. The website has a section dedicated to outreach for crossdressers, and offers as a main point of contact a man who runs a sex shop, where he sells lingerie and sex toys.
After being awarded three gold medals at the Paralympics qualifiers in 2020, Petrillo thanked the trans activist group. “I dedicated to them my victory in my favorite race,” Petrillo told OutSports. “Gruppo Trans supported me in my darkest hour, and they helped me find the answers I needed when I was questioning my identity and my life.”
A number of female athletes and professional experts have been highlighting concerns about Petrillo’s participation in the women’s category. At the Master’s Athletics Championships in Arezzo in October 2020, Petrillo outpaced Sanulli and Denise Neumann, both of whom had previously won world and European Masters titles and have been regarded as the best in their events.
The athletes took the podium with Petrillo at the time to avoid becoming embroiled in controversy, but later stated that they felt that Petrillo had an unfair advantage.
“I didn’t feel like I competed as an equal. It was my race, my goal for the season. I had been preparing it for a long time and I wanted to win,” Sanulli said at the time.
Sanulli and Neumann were among more than 30 female Master athletes who signed a petition in 2021 opposing men being permitted to identify into women’s sports.
The women were represented by Italian lawyer and athletics champion Mariuccia Fausta Quilleri, who claimed that the admission of male athletes in women’s competitions constitutes a violation of Article 1 of the Code of Equal Opportunities between Men and Women.
The petition was sent to the president of the Italian Athletics Federation, Stefano Mei, the Minister for Equal Opportunities, Elena Bonetti, and the undersecretary of state for sport, Valentina Vezzali. According to women’s rights group RadFem Italia, their efforts were not acknowledged by the government officials.
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