Maria José Martínez-Patiño (born 10 July 1961) is a Spanish former

hurdler Hurdling is the act of jumping over an obstacle at a high speed or in a sprint. In the early 19th century, hurdlers ran at and jumped over each hurdle (sometimes known as 'burgles'), landing on both feet and checking their forward motion. Today, ...

, whose dismissal from the Spanish Olympic team in 1986 for failing the gender test is a notable moment in the history of

sex verification in sports Sex verification in sports (also known as gender verification, or loosely as gender determination or a sex test) occurs because eligibility of athletes to compete is restricted whenever sporting events are limited to a single sex, which is gen ...

. Martínez-Patiño was dismissed after a competition that would have set her up for participation at the

1988 Summer Olympics The 1988 Summer Olympics (), officially known as the Games of the XXIV Olympiad () and commonly known as Seoul 1988 ( ko, 서울 1988, Seoul Cheon gubaek palsip-pal), was an international multi-sport event held from 17 September to 2 October ...

. She was shamed publicly when she participated in a hurdles event in the Spanish national championships in 1986, but fought the loss of her IAAF license successfully and was able to compete for participation in the 1992 Olympics. Since then she has written about her experience, and her test and its fallout has become a highly publicized and frequently cited case concerning sex testing as well as the privacy of athletes.

Athletic career

Martínez-Patiño participated in the

100 metres hurdles The 100 metres hurdles, or 100-meter hurdles, is a track and field event run mainly by women (the male counterpart is the 110 metres hurdles). For the race, ten hurdles of a height of are placed along a straight course of . The first hurdle is ...

, where her best time is 13.71 (Madrid 1983). Her best performance in international competition was 13.78, at the 1983 World Championships in Athletics in

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the capital, primate, and most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of Uusimaa in southern Finland, and has a population of . The city ...

Sex testing

Martínez-Patiño is a 46,XY woman who has

androgen insensitivity syndrome Androgen insensitivity syndrome (AIS) is a difference in sex development involving hormonal resistance due to androgen receptor dysfunction. It affects 1 in 20,000 to 64,000 XY ( karyotypically male) births. The condition results in the partial ...

(AIS). She passed a sex test in 1983 at the IAAF World Championships, and received her "certificate of femaleness". However, she failed the sex chromatin test in 1985, and thus was ruled ineligible to participate in women's athletics. The test was taken during the 1985 World University Games in Kobe, Japan, as a result of her having forgotten to bring the result from a test two years before, which she passed. The sex chromatin test was, at the time, the first step in the sex verification process, and not intended to provide a definitive and final decision, but officials from the

International Olympic Committee The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swiss ...

and the

International Association of Athletics Federations World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation (from 1912 to 2001) and International Association of Athletics Federations (from 2001 to 2019, both abbreviated as the IAAF) is the international governing body fo ...

routinely advised athletes to fake an injury after such a test so they could withdraw from competition quietly and protect their privacy. This is what Martínez-Patiño was advised to do, and she complied. Two months later she received a letter that classified her as male, citing her karyotype, 46,XY, though any perceived advantage she could be said to have is negated by her AIS: "she was disqualified for an advantage that she did not have". In 1986, she entered the 60 metres hurdles event in the Spanish national championships but was told that she could either withdraw quietly or be denounced in public. She competed and won, and was punished in the Spanish press. She lost her scholarship and her athletic residency, besides paying a high personal price by losing her privacy and her fiancé. She continued to fight her expulsion: in 1988 she was defended by the genetic scientist Albert de la Chapelle; and her IAAF license was restored three months later. She tried to qualify for the 1992 Olympics, but fell short by one-tenth of a second.

Published works

Martínez-Patiño described her experience in "Personal Account: A woman Tried and Tested", published by ''

The Lancet ''The Lancet'' is a weekly peer-reviewed general medical journal and one of the oldest of its kind. It is also the world's highest-impact academic journal. It was founded in England in 1823. The journal publishes original research articles, ...

'' in 2005. In "Reexamining Rationales of 'Fairness': An Athlete and Insider's Perspective on the New Policies on Hyperandrogenism in Elite Female Athletes" published by the '' American Journal of Bioethics'' in 2012, Martínez-Patiño and co-author

Hida Viloria Hida Viloria (born May 29, 1968) is a Latine American writer, author, producer, and human rights activist. Viloria is intersex, nonbinary, and gender nonconforming, using they/them pronouns. They are known for their writing, their intersex and ...

discussed current sex testing practices in sport.

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