Canadian powerlifter spearheading the movement to persuade sports authorities that biological men should not compete with women.
Independent Women’s Forum is pleased to announce that Canadian powerlifter, April Hutchinson, is the latest entry in our popular series of Champion Women profiles.
Think of April as Canada’s Riley Gaines, only on dry land. She is spearheading the move to convince Canadian sports authorities that biological men have inherent advantages over women athletes.
April was friendly with powerlifter Anne Andre. When Anne confessed in a Facebook conversation that he was a man who identified as a trans woman, April was stunned. “I said, ‘You should not be competing against women.’ And he admitted that he has an advantage over females.”
“Put aside the testosterone levels,” Hutchinson explains, “and men still have way more muscle mass, fast twitch fibers, V02 Max, everything, right? We’re talking like huge physiological differences.” According to the rules of the Canadian Powerlifting Union, male-to-female athletes do not have to make it public that they are trans. Nor are hormone therapy or surgical alteration requirements. All that is required is to claim to identify as female and show a corresponding government ID.
Hutchinson boycotted a national tournament at which she was scheduled to compete with Andrews and instead got in touch with the International Consortium on Female Sport’s Linda Blade, a Canadian coach and coauthor of Unsporting: How Trans Activism and Science Denial Are Destroying Sport, who became an ally of April’s. Blade and Hutchinson started a letter-writing campaign to convince the Canadian Powerlifting Union to change its policy on transgender athletes. Right now, anyone who identifies as a woman can compete against women.
Anne Andres’ U.S. counterpart is Jaycee Cooper, a male powerlifter who identifies as a transgender woman, and who recently won a lawsuit against USA Powerlifting (USAPL). Cooper claimed that USAPL was not complying with the Minnesota Human Rights Act’s anti-discrimination provisions because it denied him the right to participate as a woman in the Women’s State Championship.
This isn’t April Hutchinson’s first life-changing battle. She overcame an addiction to alcohol that landed her in an ICU several years ago. Powerlifting is a big part of her sober life.
We know you will enjoy meeting April, a battle-scarred but cheerful warrior.
