NEW HAVEN, Conn. — A runner who is suing to stop transgender athletes from participating in girls track in Connecticut won a head-to-head race for the second time against her transgender opponent.
Chelsea Mitchell, of Canton High School, beat Terry Miller, of Bloomfield High School, in the 55-meter dash Saturday at the Connecticut State Open indoor track meet. Mitchell also beat Miller last week in the State Class S championship race.
These are the first races in the seniors’ high school careers that Miller has lost to Mitchell.
Mitchell won Saturday with a time of 7.15 seconds. Kedarjah Lewis, of Haddam-Killingworth High School, came in second at 7.31 seconds and Miller placed third in 7.37 seconds.
“My head just wasn’t in the game today for personal reasons, people can make their assumptions if they want,” Miller told The Hartford Courant.
Mitchell and two other Connecticut high school runners filed a lawsuit earlier this month seeking to block a state policy that allows high school athletes to compete based on the gender with which they identify, arguing transgender girls have an unfair physical advantage.
Both Miller and Andraya Yearwood, the only other transgender athlete currently running track in Connecticut, are seeking to become defendants in that lawsuit. The suit currently only names the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference, which is the state’s governing body for high school sports, and several local boards of education.
Mitchell said she was not thinking about the lawsuit during the race.
“When it comes time for a practice and a meet, I just try and push all of that out of my mind,” she said.
Connecticut is one of 17 states that allowed transgender high school athletes to compete without restrictions as of 2019, according to Transathlete.com, which tracks state policies in high school sports across the country.
Eight states had restrictions that make it difficult for transgender athletes to compete while in school, such as requiring them to use the gender on their birth certificate or allowing them to participate only after going through sex reassignment procedures or hormone therapies, according to Transathlete.
Both Miller and Yearwood are receiving hormone therapy as treatment for gender dysphoria, and both have hormone levels, “including testosterone levels, circulating in their bodies that are typical for non-transgender girls,” their lawyers said in court documents.
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