Martina Navratilova Slams Austin Killips After He Wins Another Women's Race

Another male athlete stole a championship from a female over the weekend, and tennis legend Martina Navratilova is not impressed.

Austin Killips, a biological male, won the Belgian Waffle Ride 131-mile course in North Carolina on Saturday. He finished with a time of 8 hours, 28 minutes and 7 seconds — five minutes ahead of second-place female Paige Onweller.

For comparison, the winner of the men's event finished with a time of 7 hours, 23 minutes and 23 seconds. So Killips is the "women's" champ but would have lost to the first-place male by over an hour.

And that's not a fact that's lost on Navratilova.

"What a joke," she tweeted.

And Navratilova isn't the only athlete to call out the injustice.

Former Olympic British distance runner Mara Yamauchi retweeted a video where Killips discussed his strategy for the race.

"Man explains how he won a women's cycling race," Yamauchi interjected.

"It was just a grueling effort. I'm just really proud to lay it out there and get the result," Killips said after the race. "You really want to be up front going into those technical single-track sections, and I kind of asserted myself there and was able to get a gap early."

He asserted himself, all right. And this isn't the first time.

Austin Killips joins the growing list of trans athletes drastically affecting women's chances of competing for first place.

This weekend's first-place win awarded Killips a $5,000 prize pot.

In late April, Killips placed first in the women's category at the Tour of the Gila.

Killips' win earned him a $35,000 prize pot over second-place cyclist Marcela Prieto, a biological female.

After that race, Navratilova spoke out as well.

"Transgender cyclist Austin Killips wins women's race, causes outrage — this will happen more and more — women's sports is NOT THE PLACE for trans identified male athletes," she tweeted on May 3.

Killips' history of aggression against female competitors also draws questions.

According to a report from Reduxx, Killips joined the women's category at the UCI Cyclocross National Championship in 2022. He attempted to push female cyclist Hannah Arensman off the racing course several times.

Arensman, a 35-time cyclocross champ, presented the incident to the governing body's attention. She decided to walk away from the sport due to their lack of resolve.

(Photo by DAVID PINTENS/BELGA MAG/AFP via Getty Images)

Unlike some international sporting bodies, like World Athletics and World Aquatics, the Union Cycliste Internationale allows female-identifying men to compete in women's races.

However, the governing body said last month it would "analyze the current situation" and review its rules for transgender athletes.

A new decision is anticipated in August.