He’s (almost) all boy but will wrestle girls for a state title. Is that right?

Starting Friday morning inside a fieldhouse northwest of Houston, wrestler Mack Beggs of Euless Trinity High School will begin his pursuit of a girls state championship in the 110-pound weight class.

If reading that sentence feels like a half-nelson gripping your eyeballs, don’t worry, you read it correctly: Beggs will indeed begin his pursuit of a girls state title. He will join 11 other Trinity wrestlers — eight girls and three boys — at the two-day state tournament at Berry Center in the Cypress-Fairbanks school district.

Beggs is transgender transitioning from female to male, and a 17-year-old junior who is undefeated on the season. He started testosterone replacement therapy in October 2015. He will weigh in Thursday afternoon as a 5-foot-2, fit-and-trim athlete. A healthy boy by every distinguishable measure — with clothes on.

But not by University Interscholastic League standards. The state’s governing body demands Beggs compete as a girl, or not all, even though Nancy Beggs, Mack’s grandmother and guardian, said he would prefer to compete against boys. A year ago, the UIL put to a vote of school district superintendents across the state an amendment that would require gender to be determined by birth certificate.

It overwhelmingly passed 586-32.

So Beggs, who was born a girl, will wrestle as a girl.

The UIL’s decision went opposite of the NCAA, which in 2011 set transgender policy as requiring a trans male athlete who is receiving testosterone treatment, such as Beggs, to compete on a men’s team, while prohibiting the athlete from competing on a women’s team. Before the 2016 Summer Oympics in Rio de Janerio, the International Olympic Committee issued updated transgender guidelines allowing athletes who transition from female to male to compete in the male category without restriction.

“Dealing with transgender adolescent athletes is probably the most difficult time frame to make a ruling. In the NCAA, there would be no question that Mack would be required to compete against men, but that’s not an option for him because of the UIL rule,” said Joanna Harper, 60, a medical physicist in Portland, Ore., and a transgender female and elite runner who served as an adviser to the IOC. “I think the UIL rule is misguided, shortsighted and I actually find a wonderful irony in it.”

The irony? Harper said she surmises the birth certificate rule was intended to protect female athletes from competing against males transitioning to female.

A transgender female athlete whose testosterone level has not been decreased sufficiently would possess a physical superiority against female competitors. Yet by forcing Beggs, a transgender male taking testosterone, to compete against girls — essentially as a girl on the “juice” — the rule fails to keep the competition on a fair and safe playing field.

“This is the exact opposite effect of what they had desired,” Harper said.

Forfeits and a lawsuit

Because high school wrestling is a niche sport that plays in the shadow of the state football playoffs and basketball season, Beggs’ transgender story was virtually unknown outside of the wrestling community. That all changed in an explosive way last weekend when he won the Class 6A girls regional tournament in Allen.

Beggs’ opponent in the championship match forfeited, reportedly out of safety concerns. It was the second match of the tournament that Beggs won by forfeiture, and the only two matches all season in which an opponent refused to wrestle, according to his grandmother, a passionate supporter who rarely misses a meet.

At the conclusion of the regional tournament came the revelation of a lawsuit filed against the UIL by attorney Jim Baudhuin, a father of a female Coppell High School wrestler. Baudhuin said his daughter is friends with Beggs. She wrestles in a different weight class and disapproved of her dad filing a lawsuit that sought to bar Beggs from competing against girls at the state tournament. It claims allowing a wrestler to compete on testosterone exposes other female athletes to bodily harm.

“There’s a reason they’re called performance-enhancing drugs and why they’re banned by every anti-doping agency in the world,” Baudhuin said. “There’s no question it is an advantage.”

Suddenly, Beggs’ story made national headlines, with articles appearing on media outlets from USA Today to Outsports.com. All this week, reporters have clamored to speak with Beggs and his grandmother, even milling outside their home for hours at a time, Nancy Beggs said. The furor led Steve Chapman, superintendent of the Hurst-Euless-Bedford school district, to issue a gag order on the wrestling team, including Coach Travis Clark and anyone associated with the squad or Trinity until after the state tournament.

Serving as a relevant backdrop are controversial state and national transgender issues such as Senate Bill 6 — the so-called bathroom bill — in the Texas Legislature, and President Donald Trump’s decision Wednesday to rescind an Obama-era directive that let transgender students use bathrooms and locker rooms that match their chosen gender identity.

Because no legal action could be taken prior to the start of the state tournament, Baudhuin said the lawsuit he initially filed Feb. 7 in Tarrant County — and was subsequently transferred to Travis County — is being amended in an attempt to keep Beggs from competing against girls next year, when he will be two years into testosterone treatment. Baudhuin said he, other wrestling parents and rival coaches don’t want Beggs to be strong-armed out of the sport. They just want him to wrestle on the boys team.

Baudhuin said coaches at rival schools have told him some of their wrestlers say they’re hesitant to grapple with Beggs, and that others have asked if they will need to take testosterone, which helps build muscle strength, to compete with him. Several coaches contacted for this story were in no hurry to return messages.

“This is not and never has been some kind of vendetta or rivalry,” Baudhuin said. “[Beggs] is a great kid. It is not hatred. It’s a resentment because other parents see this as cheating.”

‘Twisted logic’

Beggs, as happy and well-adjusted as any teenager according to his grandmother and others, does not take testosterone to gain a competitive advantage. He takes it to transition to a boy, to identify as the gender he always believed he was meant to be. UIL rules include a provision that allows a competitor to use steroids if they are “dispensed, prescribed, delivered and administered by a medical practitioner for a valid medical purpose.” Beggs’ medical records were sent to the UIL and he was granted clearance to compete.

And as with any athlete, all Beggs wants to do is compete, so he follows the rules put in place. The UIL stands by the rule. Spokeswoman Kate Hector said the UIL’s policy is not to comment on a specific student. The organization released a generic statement Wednesday: “To compete at this year’s wrestling state tournament all students are subject to UIL rules and state law. This helps ensure a fair competition to the more than 400 students participating. We will continue to work with member schools to best meet the needs of all students.”

The UIL declined to comment on whether there are other transgender wrestlers competing at state.

Medical experts say competitive and safety claims made in the lawsuit have merit because Beggs’ development as a male does give him a physical advantage against most female competitors in his age range and weight class.

Dr. Eric Vilain, professor of human genetics and pediatrics at UCLA and an adviser on gender issues for the IOC, agrees with the NCAA and IOC policies of allowing female-to-male athletes using testosterone to compete against males. He called the UIL’s decision to use a birth certificate to determine gender “twisted logic.”

“Most of the discussions” regarding the revised IOC guidelines “were for male to female [transition], which is much more controversial,” Vilain said. “Female to male, this was a very easy consensus by saying the female to male athletes could compete in the male category, and would be allowed an exemption to use testosterone. It makes complete sense.

“That’s why this case has a completely twisted logic based on some social argument that the sex on the birth certificate supersedes any other identity. It doesn’t make any sense. From a sports perspective, men and women are in two different categories, and for good reason. If not, women would lose most of the time.”

‘You can’t have it all’

As if transitioning weren’t complicated enough, the athletic side for Beggs, a three-time state qualifier, must be somewhat confounding and frustrating because of the requirement to compete against girls.

While he is on the verge of becoming a state champion, he would do so competing against the the gender that he does not identify with, and contrarians — and certainly parents of opponents he will have defeated — will argue that he won unfairly.

Yet had he wrestled against boys all season, his chances of reaching the state tournament likely would have been drastically diminished. While Beggs holds a physical advantage against most of his female opponents, some contend that his body is not yet sufficiently developed as a male to consistently compete against boys.

“It’s an interesting question because he has not gone through as much time with testosterone exposure as a regular 17-year-old would have,” Vilain said. “On average, puberty in boys starts at 13. They would have four years of exposure, where he would only have one.

“At face value, that’s right. However, you can’t have it all.”

This story was originally published February 23, 2017 at 1:46 PM with the headline "He’s (almost) all boy but will wrestle girls for a state title. Is that right?."