Biological Male Wins Washington Girls’ Championship Race for Second Year in a Row
A 17-year-old transgender-identifying biological male won a Washington state high school track championship over the weekend after controversially winning last year.
Veronica Garcia, who competes on the East Valley High School girls’ team, claimed the state title for the girls’ 2A 400-meter race Saturday with a time of 55.75 seconds. Footage circulated on social media showing Garcia crossing the finish line with a substantial lead over the biological female competitors. In 2023, Garcia won the same event with a slightly faster time of 55.59.
Before and after the race, members of the crowd could be heard booing Garcia’s participation. According to The Daily Wire, spectators cheered for each female runner during the medal ceremony but booed when Garcia was announced as the winner. One man in the crowd wore a shirt that read “Save Women’s Sports” and was heard shouting “Let’s go girls!” and “Girls’ race!”
Following the race, Garcia acknowledged that he expected backlash in an interview with The Seattle Times.
“I’ll be honest, I kind of expect it,” Garcia said. “But it maybe didn’t have their intended effect. It made me angry, but not angry as in, I wanted to give up, but angry as in, I’m going to push.”
“I’m going to put this in the most PG-13 way, I’m just going to say it’s a damn shame they don’t have anything else better to do. I hope they get a life. But oh well. It just shows who they are as people,” Garcia added.
Garcia previously competed in boys’ races, where his performance was far less competitive. In 2022, he ran the boys’ junior varsity 5,000-meter race and finished 164th out of 172 participants.
The latest win has drawn sharp criticism from women’s rights activists, including former collegiate swimmer Riley Gaines, who congratulated the second-place finisher, Lauren Matthew.
“Congratulations to Lauren Matthew, the real Washington State Champion in the girls’ 400m,” Gaines posted on X. Another post showed Matthew holding a sign that read, “Washington State Track and Field Real Girls 2A 400m Champion.”
