We’ve all witnessed the massive disruptions caused in the world of girls’ and women’s sports over the past several years by the admittance of transgender athletes into various competitions, both in collegiate and professional events. These disruptions have impacted a variety of sports including wrestling, weightlifting, track, and, of course, NCAA swimming, where Lia Thomas used his natural, male physical superiority to dominate a sport where his performances against other men were unremarkable at best. But a different sporting event is drawing attention this week for similar reasons and it certainly caught me by surprise. A high school volleyball match in North Carolina was brought to a halt when a male transgender competitor spiked the ball into the head of one of the girls on the opposing team at such a great velocity that the girl sustained lasting injuries to her head and neck. (National Review)

A North Carolina high-school volleyball athlete has suffered a severe injury after a transgender player threw an “abnormally fast” ball at her head, newly released video footage shows.

The male opponent hurled the volleyball at approximately 70 mph, according to the Daily Mail. One bystander claimed that it was “abnormally” fast, the publication said. The female teammate at Hiwassee Dam High School experienced trauma to the head and neck, reportedly.

She is still recovering from long-term concussion symptoms, including problems with her vision. She has not yet been approved to compete again.

You can watch the actual spiking of the ball in the video embedded below. (The video is a bit on the grainy side and this clip is embedded in a longer piece, but you can fast forward to the 2:11 mark to watch the shot.) I’m not sure if that ball was literally doing seventy miles per hour or even if a volleyball is capable of going that fast, but it was definitely a hard shot. It was described locally as being “abnormally fast.”

Both of the players involved in the incident are minors so they are not being named due to privacy reasons. The injured student reportedly suffered a concussion and injuries to her neck. Rather than punishing the student who launched the rocket shot at her, the injured girl’s team from Hiwassee Dam High School will now forfeit all future games against Highlands High School, where the transgender player competes.

I’ve always tended to think of volleyball as a noncontact sport so it didn’t seem like the sort of athletic activity that would be ruined by female-to-male transgender participation. But I suppose being hit by the ball is an actual danger, as was shown to be the case here.

I’m also failing to see how the initial resolution to this issue is remotely fair to anyone. First of all, the injured student will be facing a serious recovery curve from this injury and it may end her athletic career and collegiate hopes. On top of that, the rest of her team will be forced to suffer by defaulting to forfeiting the rest of their games against the school where the clearly physically superior boy is being allowed to play.

Just out of curiosity, I attempted to look up some data on the speed of a spiked volleyball. Among female competitors, the record for the fastest volleyball spike was at one point held by Yanelis Santos Allegne of Cuba who was recorded spiking a ball at 64 miles per hour. So if this trans player managed seventy, that’s seriously fast. Curiously, a male competitor was reportedly clocked spiking a volleyball at 110 miles per hour. That seems like an awfully large discrepancy between the genders to me, but here we are.

For the time being, we’ll just have to wish the injured competitor a full and speedy recovery and mark this down as yet another example of why boys should not be allowed to compete against girls in sporting events. No amount of hormones or gender-mutilating surgery will ever fully erase the inherent competitive advantage that men have over women in these events. And the rules should be modified to acknowledge that reality.