History was made over the weekend on the Ottawa River. For the first time ever, two openly transgender athletes competed in a rowing race in Canada.
Enza Anderson and Savannah Burton finished fourth out of five teams, with a timing of just over two hours, about 10 minutes the behind the first-place finishers in a 22-kilometre race.
The pair began rowing seriously just two months ago and belong to a five-person team called Team TRANS-fusion.
The team’s introduction to rowing was part of a pilot project that sought to attract transgender people to the Learn-to-Row program at the Hanlan Boat Club in Toronto.
Ms. Anderson, 50, said she stayed away from sports for most of her life, wary of the discrimination that transgender athletes can face.
Burton, 39, said her love of sports took a back seat when she recently transitioned from male to female.
The executive director of the human rights advocacy group Egale Canada, Helen Kennedy, said the event pushed “the boundaries for basic equality.”
Ms. Kennedy said that despite the increasing awareness of transgender issues systemic homophobia and transphobia still plague the sports world.
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