Welcome to Good Game with Sarah Spain, where we'll be ignoring any and all responsibilities to focus on what actually matters this weekend basketball, basketball, and more basketball.
Bring on the Sweet sixteen and Elite eight.
It's Friday, March twenty eighth, and on today's show, we'll be talking with c c Telfer, a Jamaican American track athlete and the first out transgender athlete to win an
NCAA title. We discuss the biggest misconceptions that folks tend to have about trans athletes, why self care means so much more to her, inviting politicians, even those who oppose trans women in sports, to have a conversation with her and her fraught relationship with International Transgender Day of Visibility coming up on Monday.
Plus, the Sweet sixteen is upon us.
We're dropping a whole lot of WNBA news and a what the fact on the power of inclusion. It's all coming up right after this. Welcome back sl This says Happy Friay. Here's what you need to know today. Kicking things off with March Madness, The Sweet sixteen gets rolling on ESPN today at two thirty pm Eastern with you know nothing special, just the first iteration of the Duke North Carolina Tobacco road rivalry ever in the history of
the women's NCAA tournament. Carol Awsom will look to usher the number two Duke Blue Devils into the Elite Eight for the first time in her five season tenure at the school, while the number three UNC tar Heels and Courtney Banghart are seeking the first Elite eight berth in her six seasons in Chapel Hill. Next on the schedule
number one South Carolina and number four Maryland. At five pm Eastern, Don Staley's Game Cocks are buying to inch closer to a second consecutive NCAA title, while Brenda Freese's Terps hope to reach the regional final for the second time in three seasons. Keep an eye on junior forward Chloe Kitts, who's put up double figures in each of SC's last seven games, and keep in mind that Marylyn is coming off that tough double overtime win over Bama, so fatigue could be an.
Issue for them.
At seven thirty pm Eastern, to NC State Wolfpack squares off with number three LSU. Last season, the Pack turned some heads with a run to the final four, and they're hoping to conjure up some more of that magic. Meantime, Kimmulke's Tigers are back at full strength with Starguardflage Johnson back in the rotation after missing the entire SEC tournament resting some shin inflammation. LSU is seeking a second title in three years, and through two rounds they have been hot.
They're the first team since Long Beach State in nineteen eighty eight to score one hundred points or more in consecutive tournament games. Last, but not least, the number one UCLA Bruins play number five ole Miss at ten pm Eastern. Corey Close in Ucla survived a first half scare from number eight Richmond in the last round of action, but they're battle tested. Led by six foot seven junior center
Lauren Betts. Ole Miss is playing excellent ball under Yolette McPhee McEwan, trying to crack the Elite eight for the first time in her seven seasons as head coach. There are four more games on Saturday two, starting at one pm Eastern, with number two TCU taking on number three
Notre Dame. Then it's number one Texas versus Number five Tennessee by number two Yukon facing number three Oklahoma and wrapping up with number one USC look into Sol drawn without Juju Watkins as they meet number five Kansas State. Elite eight games will take place on Sunday and Monday, narrowing the field down to the teams that'll head to Tampa for the Final four next weekend.
A Tadmore College Hoops.
News Florida State junior guard Tenaya Latson, who led the NCAA and scoring this season, is entering the transfer portal. Her reps at Clutch Sports broke the news to ESPNS Andrea Carter yesterday. Per a tweet from Carter, Latson is keeping all options open, including a return to FSU. Latson, a three time member of the All acc First Team, averaged twenty five point two points per game, four point six rebounds, and four point six assists this season while
shooting forty five percent from the floor. In WNBA news, three time champ Candice Parker is getting her moment.
Y'all. The Los Angeles Sparks.
Will retire her number three jersey at Crypto dot Com Arena at halftime on June twenty ninth, during the team's game against the Chicago. Sky Parker brought star power to the Sparks brand when she was drafted first overall out of Tennessee in eight becoming the first and still only simultaneous Rookie of the Year and League MVP. In twenty sixteen, she helped the Purple and Gold end a championship draft of fourteen years, and then spent four more seasons in
LA before leaving for her hometown Chicago. Sky CP three then helped the Sky to the franchise's first ever WNBA title in twenty twenty one. So it's fitting that the jersey retirement ceremony will take place at Sparks. Sky Parker's jersey will join Hall of Famer Lisa Leslie and former general manager Penny Toller's threads in LA's rafters. In a statement released by the Sparks, Parker said, quote, to see my jersey hanging in the rafters amongst other legends is truly in honor.
This moment is not just about me.
It's about my family, my teammates, and the incredible support from the LA Sparks organization and fans. She continued, quote, I'm grateful to my parents who believed in me every step of the way, to my brothers who are still my heroes, and to my wife and kids who inspire me every day.
End quote.
Less that I could talk more about Candice and all she's done for the game, but then we'd have an hour's long show, so I'll.
Just be brief. Candice, you are one of one. We love you.
We can't wait to celebrate you. June twenty ninth, More WNBA news. The WNBA is New York. Liberty announced yesterday that the franchise is building an eighty million dollar practice facility projected to open in twenty twenty seven, calling it the first ever facility quote designed by players for players end quote. Sabrina Escu, John Quell Jones, and Brianna Stewart collaborated with global design firm Populace on behalf of their whole squad, helping create a space that suits the team's
needs on and off the floor. The facility will be located in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, overlooking the Manhattan Skyline, and it'll span seventy five thousand square feet. Amenities at the facility will include private suites for each player instead of traditional lockers, two full practice courts, an outdoor basketball court, a roof deck, player dining area, an indoor outdoor two story strength training room, an in house player hair, nail and makeup studio, and
so much more. Honestly, that sounds like paradise. Hey, Si, family, libs Ellie, everybody over there?
Can I move in?
There's enough space, right, you won't even notice I'm there. Promise I'm real quiet, and even more w happenings.
Per the Golden State Valkyries.
Earlier this week, the franchise became the league's first ever to sell ten thousand season tickets.
We love to hear it.
The Bay Area is buzzin' for women's basketball, and the Valkyries tip off their inaugural season against the LA Sparks at Chase Center on May sixteenth. Two NWSL games on the slate tonight is the Houston Dash host Scotham FC, and the Washington Spirit welcome BAFC to the district open for a fourth straight home match sellout at Audiyfield. Both games kickoff at eight pm Eastern. Five more games across the weekend, including the kc Current hosting the Utah Royal
Saturday at seven thirty pm Eastern. Last year's Golden Boot winner tim Wushewingo will be looking to tie her own NWSL record of eight straight games with a goal.
We'll link to the schedule in our show notes.
Finally, in college Softball News, Tennessee pitcher Carlin Pickens, the reigning SEC Pitcher of the Year, made history on Monday with a seventy eight point two mile prime pitch in the Lady Bowls game against Arkansas. The pitch is the fastest recorded in NCAA history and may even be the fastest of all time. Monica Abbott, who was also a Lady Vowl, had a seventy seven mile prior pitch in
a National Pro Fast Pitch game in twenty twelve. That till now had been the fastest softball pitch according to the Guinness Book.
Of World Records.
But our research also found a Japanese pitcher, Yukiko uh I know, who's said to have thrown a fast pitch of one hundred and twenty eight kilometers per hour, which is about seventy nine miles per hour. So we'll just tell you that pickens pitch was fast, real fast, College record breaking, Guinness World record breaking, and maybe more. Pickens has already received an invite to play in a Savannah
Banana's game. No word yet on whether she'll just pitch or get to hop in on a choreographed dance too. By the way, we know, it's Friday and she threw the pitch on Monday. But Tennessee's Cherry Parker Lee Stadium is five hundred and fifty miles from Good Game HQ here in Chicago, and it's seventy eight miles per hour.
It took a little while to get here.
We got to take a quick break when we come back my conversation with CC Telfer.
But first a quick note. CC's perspective in.
This interview is informed, of course, by her lived experience. At times, some of what she says doesn't seem entirely consistent with the latest science or academic studies.
But here a good Game.
We're prioritizing running this interview because far too often conversations about trans people and trans athlete inclusion in sports don't actually involve trans voices. So while CC might not have all the perfect answers or have every relevant statistic right off the top of her head, we think it's more important for her voice to be heard as opposed to having folks continue to speak around her without regard for her humanity. All right, my conversation with CC's up next?
Stick around joining us now.
She's a Jamaican born track athlete and twenty nineteen Division two NCAA champion in the four hundred meter hurdles, an author, activist, and model. If you scroll her Insta, you know she loves a matching work outfit and a bright jewel tone dress.
At CC telfer, what's up? CC? Thanks for joining us?
Hey you know, Sarah, I'm here. Thank you so much for having me. Sorry about being tardy. Listen on me.
You're fine, You're here, That's what matters.
Thank you.
I want to start by talking about part of the reason you're here, transitive visibility coming up on Monday the thirty first, and I want to ask, just in general, what are your feelings about the day and have they changed in recent years.
Honestly, Sarah, it's become a bittersweet moment for me. I don't know if you guys have done any research, but back when I qualified for the Tokyo Olympics, they were giving me a really hard time in accommodating me than meaning World Athletics. They weren't really giving me good directions. So with that happening International Trensgender Day of Visibility, I would band on that day in twenty twenty two. So
it was just like that. It's a bittersweet moment that like, thank you so much for the recognition, but like, no, think you because it's fake and the fact that you threw it in my face that you're not allowed to be an athlete. But on top of that, we're going to ban you on yours day that we recognize you
and see you and supposedly see you. So it was very hurtful to get that notification on that day and right and now looking forward, it just feels like a constant reminder that I don't belong and that I'm allowed to be anything else except this I'm allowed to be. But it's truly not that I'm allowed to be, it's what can we allow you to be? You know, and then ban you on your the day that we're supposed to see you.
Yeah, it's almost like this weird dichotomy of like you both appreciate and want to be recognized and also you just want to fit in and not stand out, right, and in that moment, the fact that they didn't allow you to fit and meant that you didn't get to participate. You know, in a recent interview, you talked about how, prior to this administration, you knew that you woke up every day and you left the house and that you
might have to face some adversaries. But now because of this administration, quote, I wake up every day and I have to make sure that I.
Make it home alive.
Yes, can you share how things have changed for you just even in the past few months.
Absolutely, I do feel as though that the far right has gotten louder about their hate for transgender people. It's not about women in sports. It's just about controlling the narrative and controlling who gets to exist and who doesn't. Respectfully, the Trump administration and I have a personal relationship. They did call me out in twenty nineteen, his son's calling me a grave injustice to women's sports me personally, and
that kind of put a target on my back. The target has gotten louder, more confident, bolder in the past few months, and even given my workplace, a lot of Make America Great Again hats like to come to my register, like to come to my store when there's other lanes that are open, right, they like to come to me and even like to my death, like they hate me so much, but they want my services. It's just it's unfathomable,
you know. And then I have cars screaming at me, yelling out the window, call me if they call me, all of these things, knowing very well that, like, you know, I'm a woman, so like in my long hair, I'm wearing like a trop top, short shirts whatever it may be that time, like I very much exude feminine. I very much exude h beauty and femininity. So it's just like to be screamed at and yelled at in like
you know, in a gay friendly neighborhood. It just shows how people have always been thinking and what they've been thinking. I'm constantly misgendered by gay white men that act like they don't know what the pro pro is.
So it feels like even the LGBTQ community.
Absolutely even going to the gym is an issue. I how am I supposed to How am I supposed to go into the locker rooms and change if they're they're they're creating this big issue about changing rooms and bathrooms. Like, right, I do see the women and now more than ever. Like even in the past few months, they've been like acting where they've been like jumping when they see me in the changing room. They've been giving me smarky looks.
And that was not the case three months ago. Women were very much like we don't care, like you know.
It's both performative, I think, in order to show displeasure, but I think it's also probably as a result of a real intention from the far right to create fear around trans people more so than ever before. The amount of money spent on advertising to demonize trans people, not
just in women's sport but in general. So then turn people into not just maybe neutral observers, but to feel like they're empowered to act or to show displeasure in a way that just wasn't okay before, or at least felt like for a while in most places it wasn't okay.
And they're scapegoating women like me to pretend that they care about women in women's sports and issues.
And now we have the research that shows that the people who are arguing on behalf of quote unquote protecting or saving women's sports are usually ones that don't have good feelings about women and women athletes in the first place exactly, so it's all up front for their anti transagenda.
You know, I want to talk about your title. Back in twenty nineteen, six years ago, you became the first out transgender athlete to win an NCAA title, winning the Division two four under meter hurdles for Franklin Pierce University. What are the emotions you feel when you remember that victory.
The emotions I feel are very much happily and sad. It feels victorious and it's very much affirming for me because one I belong, I belong on that team. I belong in that moment. I belong. I deserve to win that title just like any other ladies lining up on that line with me. And like sadness because I did get a lot of praise from a lot of ladies
that I line up on the line with me. But I'm getting a lot of hate even today from that because of that day, from some athletes that I ran with on that day in twenty nineteen are still currently mad and it's trying to resend that title or they see as an accolade, which I don't see as a title on accolade. I see it as a step further in my affirmation in who I am and my validation
of what I'm here to do. And it's never going to be a feeling of greatness and gratitude until I get to that Olympic stage because when it comes to the NCAA level, they pretend, like, you know, our existence in sports doesn't matter if you're not Division one. So in my mental state as an athlete, when I get on that Olympic stage, that's when I can start celebrating.
That's when I can start rejoicing. Right but right now, the game has just begun, So it was just another step in the right direction for me, truly.
Yeah, I want to talk about the future of your track career in a little bit, but I think part of what's probably interesting too about that win is that there are less than enthusiastic reactions to your success. There's such complicated feelings about your win, and that's not usually how how it works. Usually it's just good job you won, right, And instead you have to have it wrapped up in whether your win is some sort of referendum on the
dominance of trans participation and the reason that it's problematic. Right, it's much easier for us even those who back trans inclusion to argue when those trans athletes aren't winning absolutely because we could point to them and say, see, they just want to participate and be included and play yes, and then winning is much more complicated. So you've become, in many ways, one of the very few faces of that.
How has that been for you? How do you defend your right to win, not just be included and participate.
Well, you know, to defend my right to win. How I do that is I show up and I showed that. Like, when it comes to athletics and winning, it takes hard work, determination, blood, sweat and tear. Is just like any other athletes who are putting everything that they have, everything that they've been trained for, on that line, on that field, on that course. Right, that's what really defines me. So these people that are creating all of these noises are not athletes, so therefore
whatever they're saying doesn't really affect me as much. However, just like anybody else, that's what speaks for my success is my hard work and dedication to my sport that shows for itself, just like Angel Reis or Sydney mcloughland. Right, yeah, just like all these other girls. That's how I show up. I can't just wake up and decide to be a
female athlete as a transgender person. You know, there are levels to it, and even if I even to get on that track, I have to wait a year or two in order for everything to you know, get the green flag, to even compete.
Right and ultimately have lower testosterone levels than says women, proving it again that the success of an athlete goes so far beyond just your tea number exactly, preparation, hard work, mental, all the other stuff that goes into it. I wonder what you think like the biggest misconceptions are about trans athletes in general.
The biggest misconceptions first is that this is a choice. It's not a choice, and the choice that we had to make to be ourselves was not an easy one, so right there, right then and there, this is not a choice. I lived this life. I didn't buy it.
The second most misconception is that we have an advantage in sports, which we do not, as speaking personally, as a transgender female athlete that has to undergo rigorous medical treatment and then have to be approved by doctors, your therapists, and then have to show all of these medical implications to your board sporting body, and then there's still a lingering possibility that they might not agree. Even if you checked all the boxes and follow all the rules which
I have, you still are subjected to so much. Right, And the fact is, hormones don't play a significant part in your success as an athlete. It's determined upon how hard you work your resources that you have, so coaches and faysics are huge in being an athlete, and then just your mental and physical health overall. So with that being said, like my muscle rates, the medical transition that I'm going through, my muscle mass is little to none,
and it's constantly being deteriorated every single day. I have no testosterone in my body. My bones are getting more and more brittler. So the quote unquote advantage that everybody is talking about, especially because they like to pinpoint puberty, all of that medically and scientifically is non existent anymore. And these people that come up with these rules have done the research and it's all there that shows that when undergoing all of these hormone replacement therapies, there are
no advantages. There are none of these underlying factors that everybody's talking about right, and then they try to make the comparison that, oh, what about when you were competing on the male team and on the female team. Well, if you really think about it, I'm a female athlete competing with the males, Like my hormones and all of that are already female. So therefore I'm not going to be as fast, I'm not going to be as good.
I'm not going to be as great because not only I'm going through medical implications that is taking away my talent, but I'm competing against men who are naturally talented, fast and good at what they do without medical implications. Right, Right, So when I go in the right category that I belong in, you now see that the numbers are correlating and they're matching up and they make sense.
You know.
I love this quote from friend of the Show Nikki Hilts Love Nicki non binary runner, who came on and said, if you're born into a world in which you don't fit, that means you were made to build a new one.
It is an inspiring quote.
It's powerful, it's very hopeful, but it also feels like a lot of folks who are already burdened by the weight of bigotry and hate and ignorance. Then also get tasked with the weight of advocacy and building worlds that they want to live in. And I wonder do you feel drawn to that? What's your relationship with activism and the sort of pressure to represent or speak for all trans folks.
To be honest, Sarah, there is no pressure. The only pressure is just getting up and doing what you love every day and not letting anybody stop you from doing that. That's what the pressure is. Which is so easy because as an athlete, traming and competing and putting in the work to get to where I need to be is so freeing. It's so therapeutic. It offers something a life saving aspect that nothing else can offer, not even therapy,
not even doctors. So when I get out of practice every single day, I feel so good to the point that I can conquer the world. Not even Donald Trump himself can say anything to break my heart, upset me, or make me want to go, you know, un alive myself, because I feel like that's what a lot of so much hate that's coming from that administration every single day. It can make a person without a backbone do that. So just knowing like the physical and real world benefits
of training, of being an athlete. That's what's carrying me through period. And to speak to Nicky's quote, which is such a beautifl full one, when the world is trying to make you not exist for just being who you are, that just shows and it speaks volumes of how important
your awareness and your visibility is to this world. And plus kids, if we're really talking about the kids, kids who are trans, non binary, LGBTQ, whatever it may be, different, not know how to you know, identify with whatever identity that they're struggling with. They need to see a physical manifestation of their dreams and themselves in order to you know, be who they are, be what they want to be in the world.
You know, That's what Chris Mosher always says. Yeah, friend, Chris Mosure always says, be the person you needed to see when you were younger.
And if you don't allow these people to do that, you're robbing them of their potential and of their dreams and of what they are here to do. And I am being robbed every single day ever since twenty nineteen, and a lot of people don't see that.
I think the idea of building a world. I know Meghan Rappino has talked to this too. Sometimes she just says, I just choose to live in the world. I want to exist even if it doesn't exist yet, and I act like it's already here, and hope to change the people around me so that they see things the way that I do.
And I try to embody that a lot. It's hard.
And I know you mentioned the hatred, how difficult it is to carry around remarks from this administration or from others, and how sports almost gives you a backbone.
I'm sure what you meant.
You know, it's hard for people to want to stay alive if they don't have a backbone. It's really just a support system, both internally and externally. And this thing that you love that gives you a feeling of freedom and life and identity.
Right.
I think hearing athletes of any kind talk about what sport means to them, we often don't talk about the sort of psychosomatic body mind connection of true freedom, of what you're telling your body about safety when you take deep gulping breaths when you run, it ends stress cycles that you're carrying to the track. Ever, and then releasing in sport. And that's why it's so important that you
get to be included. And you know, when we have conversations about this administration, I think a lot of people rightfully so don't want to engage with someone who wants to erase who they are. But you recently told CNN Sport, I'm willing to sit down with anybody who's willing to have the conversation, even the Trump administration, Trump himself, if he wants to sit down with me and talk and
have a human conversation and see me. Have you had many folks who make policy actually reach out to you to.
Ask you about your experience or for your counsel.
No, Sarah, And that's the funny. I'm so glad that you asked that question, because they like to think that they know and have the answers. But you don't like to incorporate or have the people be a part of the conversation or the table that are making these decisions. It makes no sense. And what you spoke on about Megan Rapino, I think three months ago, for transgender people, especially women in sports, I would say yes, I identify with that, like I have to create the world that I want
to live in which is what we're doing. But as of three months ago, it's becoming more and more unsafe to do that. It's like the more we are allowed about who we are, the more angry the far right is. It's the craziest thing. It's the craziest thing. Like I showed up to work today in a Q dress, like affirming who I am, Like you would think I'm thinking about myself, but I'm not making it difficult for other people to get the message. Lashes, eyes, nails, always done
on point. But you're still going to miss gender me. You're still gonna call me a man and go out of your way too at that you're creating an unsafe space, not only for me, but for the people around you. Because now that little girl who thought that I was a mermaid and that was a girl, you're making it confusing for her when you hear her calling me a man in sir. And this is how we create you know what I mean? That horrible narrative that we're trying
to eliminate. Sorry, I just wanted to like pop on that. Yeah, Like I love that, it's so beautiful. But when we try to create the world ourselves we are demonized, and.
Right, there has to be safety in that choice of how and where you show up to create that world. Yes, so it's hard for me to watch anti transactivists use just like blatant lies and misinformation to try to scare
people into adopting their point of view. And I think the last couple months, the way people are reacting to transfolks and being more dangerous, being more demonstrative in their hatred, is as a result of a lot of these lies, people like Senator Tommy Tuberville claiming that their entire girls teams made up of trans girls.
Oh my god, mind you.
Twenty twenty one, when Alabama band trendsgender students from competing in high school athletics, the Alabama High School Athletic Association said it wasn't aware of any trans athletes ever competing in the state.
And this is what we find.
So often policy is created for zero to one or two athletes, usually in it like preventative in advance of a problem that doesn't exist.
And I wonder how.
Do people who want to have thoughtful conversations about trans participation with nuance and data compete with those headline grabbing lies that they're using.
Honestly, Sarah, that's a really good question. And there's nothing better than having the actual source there themselves, right, There's nothing better than primary data. So the actual people with real life experiences, like myself, Chris Mooser, Chase Well, I mean, Chase is not an athlete, but you know what I mean. The athletes that are actually yes, the athletes that are actively out and like doing the work. These are the
ones that we need to invite to the conversations. And like when I called al Donald Trump and my governing bodies of track and Field, I call them out too, because they are making decisions. They see the science, and they see the proof and the results which coordinate with the science that they they studied, by the way, and I invited them to follow me on a day to day basis to see what goes on in my life and if you want to follow me around for a whole month to make sure you know what I mean,
there is no great aired. They they still don't want to do that because it's not about transgender women in sports.
It's just about it's misogyny.
Ultimately, if we can slowly use trans people and then queer people, yeah, and then women, Like so much of it is tied to staying in your lane.
Or your role ultimately exactly staying in your lane on your role, that is exactly what it is, right, How do you.
Deal with your identity and who you are and who you know? Is you being discussed mostly through the lens of statistics and policy as opposed to your humanity.
Every day It's so hard to handle, Like when people see me or knowing that I'm now like restricted to
just statistics and numbers, that like really sucks. But at the end of the day, I just how I show up or how I break through that is that I just keep continue to show up and keep continue to you know, voice my opinion on platforms like this one and CNN and you know other platforms that give me a voice to show them that, like, you know, regardless of the facts and sciences that are presented, here is
the real life experience coming from me. And you know, just looking back on where I was and where I am today is so affirming and it just empowers me to keep going in the direction that I'm going because if not me, who and nobody's going to live my life besides me?
Yeah, you know, we had the host of the Tested podcasts on our show, and some really excellent incredible reporting there, including on the ongoing study of the science behind trans participation and also athletes with differences in sex development and the kind of gamut of how human biology is not binary. But we're trying to force sports to be in a
binary so it's complicated, right. Yes, even those who believe in inclusion, particularly like the youth level, might still have questions about fairness at collegiate, pro or Olympic levels and can point to science in some ways still being sort of a jury is out. What would you say to someone who's like, yes, absolutely, at youth levels or middle school or even maybe high school, we should prioritize the humanity aspect and the participation what can be gained from
being on a team. But I'm not sure about how to police it or make rulings when you get into the highest levels.
That's a good question as well. I would say for now, working on the lower levels or the novice levels of or it's fine. Ways to always incorporate and include other kids, for sure, because at the end of the day, these are the skills that are necessary to get into the real world or to even treat other people who don't look like you necessarily, you know, as a good human being. Collaborative skills, working with other people and working together with
your classmates and your peers. These are skills that are earned are you develop over time, Especially when you're an athlete, you develop them sooner actually when you're on a team, and it just helps you integrate into society and life better knowing that there are classes of people that don't look like you, may not necessarily have the same privilege as you, but they're still human beings and they deserve to be treated well and to be treated as such.
So I feel like on the lower level, empower kids to work together and to play sports together. There are co ed teams. People like to pretend that co ed teams don't exist, they do, or.
That like younger kids don't play with older.
Kids exactly, and that boy and girls don't pay on the same team, especially when you're in preschool, middle school, elementary levels. Yeah, and these are the things that actually I think that co ed sports, especially at the lower level are are how Sydney with Gloughlins and you knows and all of these other female athletes became so amazingly
great at their sport because they were all out. They were competing with boys and they had to be the best, and they had that you know, competitive spirit that that was nurtured and manifested, you know, on and off the field with their their their peers, teachers, and their family. Like you know, a lot of these people, a lot of these successful athletes, their their family and their parents are a huge pillar in their success. And that's a
huge mental boost to ignore every and anything. Imagine if Sidney McLoughlin was going through what I was going through and having the stability that her parents get get her nothing else matters like that mental stability that you have, that mental and physical state of being, like that solitude of knowing who you are and having your parents to back you, that is huge. I don't have that. I know that like other trends female athletes like Sadie don't
have that. We look at Injury or Yearwood and Terry Mill. There are those two trends athletes that sparked this whole thing that you know, they had their parents to support them and be the shield and guide them, and look at how that came out. I saw the whole thing plan out and their moms, not their dads. A lot of their moms are on the front line saying that this is my kid and this is you know, they were advocating because a lot of the fathers didn't know
how to. And that's really what it takes. It takes the parents to intervene and say, no, my kid is going to be competing on this team whether you like it or not, because this is who they are, and what are we going to do in order to make sure that they can you know, integrate into the team appropriately.
It's about following policy that exists and continuing to update policy the best we can with a mind for inclusion and also for fairness and understanding where the science takes us and leads us, and trying to be as humane and caring as we can in the process while also trying to keep it as fair as we can. And I think that's, like I said, really hard to do when we're trying to force a binary out of people
and humans who are not necessarily in a binary. Do you think that there's a league or an organization that's getting it right.
Oh my gosh, Sarah, that's a really good question. Like right now, I think just everybody's following suit. It was cycling, Now cycling has banned, you know Chelsea Wolf and she already went to Tokyore Like, Oh, I'm like, I'm trying to think which because I feel like the last couple of months has scared everybody off and now everybody's following suit. I think the one organization that I was going to stick with was the NCAA, and they they just changed policy.
So right now I just feel like nobody we're not protected under anything. Everybody wants to cast us out. Yeah, we're fending for ourselves.
Yeah, I mean it feels like it enter your point, it does feel like there was sort of a consensus around like making their own policies and deciding based on a lot of research and science, and now they're being sort of threatened in some cases, whether you're defending or otherwise into acquiescing. Have you I've seen somebody, an individual person, have their mind changed about trans athlete participation in favor of inclusion, and what did it?
What changed their mind?
Honestly, I have changed a lot of coaches minds. I've interacted with a lot of coaches on the NCAA Division two that thought that had the narrative that it's wrong for me to be in women's sports, especially because they've seen me compete as a female athlete on the men's team, which they were okay with. But once I made that transition to like, you know, protect myself and the mental health and like do what's best for me, they completely
changed their narrative. And then they got to know me as an athlete, you know, with conferences and state championships and just constantly seeing me and then actually giving me the benefit of doubt and interacting with me, seeing how I interact with their other athletes, seeing how I because of me, their athletes actually got faster, numbers, got quicker, They actually went to national something that they didn't know, they didn't think that they were capable of doing without
having somebody like me to challenge them. A lot of the coaches have come out and said thank you so much for existing and for being here. I even had my own perceptions of transgender people until I've met you, so thank you for that, which is huge.
That's a big part of it for sure, just meeting people. They're human beings. When we tend to meet each other, regardless of our differences, we want to connect. It's it's just organic and authentic to want to connect to other humans. And there's too many people just lobbing insults from far away through a computer or through policy that they haven't recess.
Yeah, especially dads who have daughters. They have come out and saying I don't like the way this world is treating woman as a whole. And I see that like you're you know how my daughters look up to you or and they're not even trans, right, So it's just like they don't want to change that narrative, you know, and they have nothing but to embrace and do their research and now they see, well, these women are actually like regular people, right, so why not love and embrace?
And it's getting somewhere. But I feel like the last couple of months is scaring a lot of.
People right going backwards, it feels like, Yeah, I think one thing is, like you said, if you can't go out and talk to face to face someone, they can read your book from last year, Make It Count My fight to become the first transgender Olympic runner.
Why should folks read that?
And what do you talk about in that book about your hopes for your future as an athlete.
My book Make Account Fight to Be the first tran gender Olympic runner speaks a lot about my you know, coming of age, coming of coming to who I am. Storytelling is the best way to you know, get people to get involved and to have a conversation and to include different people a part of the conversation, even those that are anti trans so and it gives them the perspective of how I was thinking of what was really going on in my head during that time and leading
up to Who I Am now. And one thing that stood out to me while I was writing that book and hundreds of copies of editing and uh sleepless nights, was that little Ceci always saw herself as a little girl. She never identified as a boy, never identified as gay,
never identified as anything masculine. I've I came to the epiphany that she was always seeking the female like who she was as a as a little girl, because everything that was physical was against her thought process and everything that people was trying to constantly correct to her, like girl, boys don't do this, boys to do that, That's not what you do. You don't stand like that, you don't talk like that, you don't play back before you don't run like that, so and then she.
Was doing Yeah, it's exactly.
So that really stood out to me. And I feel like my book offers that truth and that raw storytelling that a lot of books don't have nowadays, you know.
And I married the book too, and for my audiobook, and the making comes out sometimes because it's just so it's so truthful and so impacting, and it even impacted me like reading it over and over again, like yeah, the pain that it brings, the laughter and love that it brings, Like even thinking about it right now, like I'm getting emotional because I'm looking back on where I was and who I am today and I couldn't be here.
I would have never been here today if it wasn't for little CC So I had to give her her flowers. And for a little girl to be that strong and knowing who she was when the world was telling her that this is not who she is, it's very inspiring.
How do your hopes for your future as an athlete maybe differ from the reality that you think will happen, or do you still have hope that you'll be able to pursue the dreams you have?
Right now?
Everything is just in the unknown. And I feel like the one thing that really kept me saying was waking up every day knowing that I have to go to practice and make sure that I give it everything in order to start my day or to even eat. So now that like the narrative is just so loud that it's affecting like my career, it's affecting my rent, it's
affecting the money that goes in my pocket. Like I not to like come to the realization that, you know, athletics might not be something that is for me, you know, like being in this solution or an endless cycle of being torn down and not feeling or being embraced or feeling like you're a part of something. It's it's it's
getting tired. It's nothing new, right, however, it is getting tiring, especially when the far right is just so loud, and I'm seeing that my my counterparts, like Sadie, Sadie Shiner, like she we entered a track meet together and they pulled her out of that meat like hours before she got onto that track. Had I spent eight hundred dollars to fly to Boston to compete, what would they have said to me? Because I didn't get that email that she got right right, and that would just been a
way a huge waste of money. So I find myself reconstructing my life where I can't make athletics a priority anymore. However it's not It's still there in my day to day life, Like I still feel like I cannot complete my day unless I train. I just worked an eight hour shift and my day still didn't start until I train. Once I take my shoes off and I'm on my way home, my body is completely different. I'm on the entire day like stress, Like it's the craziest thing.
So there's so much safety in sport, and I think so many safety To your point, it's like, it's not that track might not be for you. It might not be there for you. It's for you, it's clearly for you, but it might not be there for you because the.
Rules won't allow it to be.
You know, I'm sure it's hard to have so many of your interviews be about this heavy stuff, to be about people.
Who are questioning you.
I wonder what brings you joy these days if you're comfortable sharing other than running.
Honestly, that's a good question. It's really hard to find anything that brings me joy nowadays, because I just think that, like, I'm just so obsessed with being the best at what I do, even though I'm being casted out. But I would say, like, you know, getting my lashes done or getting my nails done really is affirming for me and it helps me a lot.
It's truly self Careen your case, we just use that as an excuse.
Us for highlights is been money.
But for you, it's really it's so affirming.
So because at the end of the day, if people misgendered me every day at my job, and now I feel like they're doing it on purpose. When I look down on my nails and I go to the bathroom for a bathroom break and I look in that mirror, I'm like, these bitches could never like I'm sorry, Like I look at I'm like, wow, look at her. They're just mad. These men are really really just mad because they want me so bad and you know that they
can't have me, so they have to hate me. What I tell myself to boost myself and you have to.
Keep getting those jewel tone dresses the great I'm a jewel tone girly too, so I get it.
Listen, I know, don't try to put me in a pastel. It's not gonna work.
It's not gonna work.
It's not gonna work jewel tones for me.
And then just like, honestly, like it really sucks the sides struck. But a good workout, like a good pilate session, a good sweat session, an AD session makes me feel so good because I get my body and I'm like, where is the man? Please tell me where is he? Because my body is giving top to her right here. Yeah, So I just then speak to myself like that. It's just I have to blusten myself up like that, you know.
Yeah, listen when it comes to those abs, this bitch could never I never could and even when I was doing track in college, never got that six pack. CC, thank you so much for coming on happy trans Day of Visibility. I know it's not always happy for you, but we see you and we're so grateful that you gave us some time.
Thank you so much.
We have to take another break. When we come back, we hit you with another What the Fact.
Welcome back slices.
It's time for another edition of What the Fact, this one in honor of trans Day of Visibility. First a quick recap of recent history. So, in the last few years, dozens of states have passed legislation barring transgender girls and sometimes all transgender kids, from participating in school sports that align with their gender identity.
That created a patchwork of.
Policies across the United States, with some states banning trans kids from participating, while other states followed laws that prohibited discrimination based on gender identity, and others still had no clear policy, leaving individual schools and conferences to make up their own rules. This patchwork became even more modeled a few weeks ago when President Trump cited an executive order that threatened to restrict federal funding to states that allowed
transgender girls to compete on girls sports teams. Now, it's worth remembering that executive orders are not laws, and some states have fought back, like Maine, with Governor Janet Mills arguing that Trump's executive order doesn't supersede either the current federal law Title nine or Maine's Human Rights Act, which
prohibits discrimination against transgender athletes. The far right argues that these bans are necessary in order to quote unquote protect women's sports, and often make claims that transgender girls and women are stealing roster spots from CIS girls and women. But what does the research actually say about inclusive policies
and participation? While the Center for American Progress, a public policy research institute, examined participation rates and found that in states with policies inclusive of transgender girls, all girls were
more likely to participate in sport. For example, California adopted a statewide policy in twenty fourteen allowing transgender kids to participate in sports, and in the six years that followed up until the pandemic started in twenty twenty, the participation rate of high school girls in school sports increased by fourteen percent, while the boys participation rate increased by just two percent.
So the next time.
Year, someone arguing that trans inclusion means stealing spots from cisgender girls send them the study.
We'll link to the.
Full report in our show notes. This what the fact brought to you by ELF Beauty. And here's another fact. Companies with diverse leadership make more money. Elf Beauty credits part of its success to its diverse board seventy eight percent women and forty four percent diverse, and because of that diversity, Elf has delivered twenty four consecutive quarters of sales growth, the only cosmetics brand to grow market share every single quarter. Elf is about including everyone, because when
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We love that you're.
Listening slices, but we want to get you in the game every day too, So here's our good game play of the day.
Follow CC on social media.
She's at cc Telfer on Instagram, and check out her book Make It Count, My fight to become the first transgender Olympic Runner. We'll link to our ig profile and where you can get a copy of her book in our show notes. Speaking of books, is it just me or has it been a while since I told you to pre order my book? Yeah, it feels like it just feels like it's been a while. Runs in the Family an incredible true story of football, fatherhood, and belonging.
It's available to pre order now wherever you get your books.
Nudge, nudge, go, and don't forget to subscribe, rate and review. It's easy watch making folks buy a ticket for a baby. Rating you serious Clark review with the sweet sixteen upon US, and fans of Women's all over the country snaging tickets to see their favorite teams. I'm reminded of a story recently shared by friend of the show Shimmy Miller, who just welcomed a little bundle of joy with wife and
friend of the show Lisa Byington. The duo brought baby Jordan Great Name by the Way to the Big Ten tournament earlier this month, and when Lisa entered the arena carrying her security stopped and asked for the baby's ticket. She laughed and took a step ahead before they assured her that they were dead serious. This fresh out the woomb infant would need to be a ticket holder. A Big Ten staffer came to the rescue, printing out a credential for baby Jordan instead.
So all's well, that ends well.
But y'all, it's expensive enough to be a parent already, Let's not be charging infants who can't even hold their own head up for a damn ticket. Hashtag team Jordan. Now it's your turn, rate and review. Thanks for listening. See you next week.
Good game, CC, good game, Candace.
Few trans phobes history will judge you harshly, and Karma will exact its revenge. Good Game with Sarah Spain is an iHeart women's sports production in partnership with Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment. You can find us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Production by Wonder Media Network, our producers are Alex Azzie and Misha Jones. Our executive producers are Christina Everett, Jesse Katz, Jenny Kaplan
and Emily Rudder. Our editors are Emily Rudder, Brittany Martinez, and Grace Lynch. Our associate producer is Lucy Jones and I'm Your host Sarah Spain