Caldas Banned for 5 Years for Refusing Gender-Verification Check

A Masters World Record Holder has been dominated ineligible for 5 years with all information now disqualified. Hannah Caldas, 48, gained 5 particular person races on the U.S. Maters Swimming Spring National Championships within the girls’s division.

From 2002-2004, Caldas competed in USMS occasions within the males’s division.

In 2012, Caldas narrowly missed qualifying for the London Olympics for Portugal.

According to experiences, a evaluate by the USMS concluded that Caldas had paperwork that “demonstrated she was assigned the female sex at birth and that she identifies as female.” Those experiences additionally state that the suspension got here after Caldas refused a gender-verification check.

“Chromosomal tests are invasive and expensive procedures. My insurance refuses to cover such a test because it is not medically necessary,” Caldas instructed The Sun. “No U.S. state requires genetic tests for recreational sports events like these. Not even US Masters Swimming, the national governing body for recreational adult swimming in the US, demands this for any of its events.”

The assertion by World Aquatics:

“The Aquatics Integrity Unit (AQIU) has imposed a five-year period of ineligibility on the Masters swimmer Hannah Caldas, running from 18 October 2025 to 18 October 2030, due to violations of the World Aquatics Integrity Code, the Policy on Eligibility for the Men’s and Women’s Competition Categories and the Operational Requirements to the Policy.”

Caldas is prohibited from any World Aquatics occasion as a participant or an official.

Caldas launched a press release that she is going to retire from swimming.

“I perceive and settle for the results of not complying with a World Aquatics investigation.

“But if a five-year suspension is the value I need to pay to guard my most intimate medical data, then it’s a value I’m joyful to pay – for myself, and for each different lady who doesn’t wish to undergo extremely invasive medical testing simply to swim in an older-adult competitors.

“I’ve been swimming in sanctioned occasions for over 30 years, and I’m ready to let all of it go.

“My life and privacy have been invaded enough. It is time to prioritize my health and personal safety.”