June Eastwood | University of Montana
June Eastwood | University of Montana
The Big Sky Conference recently honored a transgender student as “Female Athlete of the Week” in cross-country, sparking controversy.
June Eastwood, formerly known as Jonathan, “finished second in a field of 204 runners at the Santa Clara Bronco Invitational” and helped the University of Montana finish seventh as a team, according to a conference press release.
Eastwood beat out eight other nominated competitors for Female Athlete of the Week. The conference does not note that she is transgender.
Eastwood’s jump to the female side of competition was, however, noted on the LetsRun.com forum in August, although the original poster did not mention Eastwood by name:
“There is an athlete competing this fall in women’s cross country on a division one team who once was on a male cross country team at the division one level with (personal bests]) of 3:50 in the 1500 and 14:38 in the 5000m," the poster wrote. "This is going to shake some things up and force the NCAA to examine how it will handle this new occurrence. I can’t see how this athlete won’t be the favorite at the NCAA championships. I fear for women’s sports in the NCAA.”
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