Valentina Petrillo will be the first transgender Paralympic athlete after the visually impaired sprinter was included in the women’s 200m and 400m athletics event in Paris. The 50-year-old Italian is a bronze medalist in both events at the 2023 Paralympic World Championships.
Prior to her gender reassignment, Petrillo won 11 men’s national titles.
“It’s still hard to believe and I’m having to calm myself down, thinking I’ll be at the Paralympics. I missed out on competing in Tokyo by a very narrow margin. I’m aiming to start thinking about the Paris Games only when step on French soil,” she said, quoted by Reuters, BTA reports.
Petrillo was diagnosed with Stargardt’s disease at the age of 14, and her vision is 1/50 of the standard human vision.
International Paralympic Committee (IPC) president Andrew Parsons told the BBC that Petrillo was welcome in Paris and protected by disability laws. He said he wants the sports world to unite around allowing transgender athletes, even though many other federations have tightened the rules.
The IPC allows sports federations to admit athletes to the Paris Paralympics on their own, and athletics allows people legally recognized as women to compete in the women’s event.