South African World champion 800m runner Caster Semenya is a hermaphrodite with no womb or ovaries, an Australian newspaper has claimed.
Quoting a source close to the International Association of Athletics Federations, the Sydney Daily Telegraph said Semenya had internal testes - male sexual organs which produce testosterone and which in turn produces muscle bulk, body hair and a deep voice.
The 18-year-old won gold with a sensational final-lap sprint to streak away from the competition in Berlin last month. Britain’s Jenny Meadows took bronze in that 800m final.
Now, the paper said, the IAAF is expected to disqualify Semenya from future events and advise an operation because the condition carries grave health risks.
The IAAF received Semenya’s gender test results today. However athletics chiefs said they would not be revealed for up to two weeks - once they had had a chance to speak with Semenya.
IAAF spokesman Nick Davies said the results would only be made public once other experts had studied them and the 800m World Champion herself had been contacted personally.
Mr Davies said: ‘We have the final results from the specialist tests carried out in Germany.
These now need to be interpreted by a panel of experts drawn from the IAAF Medical Commission and some outside specialists as well.’It is likely that we will be in a position to then discuss the results, in private, with Semenya, and decide on the course of action and any public announcement.
‘Nothing will therefore be announced or confirmed until we are in a position to have the expert evaluation of the results, and discuss them with the athlete.
‘We cannot give an exact timing but probably within the next couple of weeks.’
However the Sydney Daily Telegraph claimed the results had been leaked by a source.
Referring to Semenya as a ’she’, the paper said she has three times more testosterone than a normal female.
The gender-test results could see her stripped of the gold medal she won last month in Berlin, although the IAAF claimed the recovering the medal would prove difficult.
Semenya, said the paper, is unaware of the tests identifying her as a hermaphrodite.
Fans in South Africa have strongly defended the runner amid claims by doubters that she won her medal unfairly because she was really a man.
The population has rallied behind ‘Our Girl’, hitting back at the accusations
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