sublime.
athleticism and competition are two of the greatest vehicles of self expression but are rarely examined in spaces like this. rather we tend to see the flip side of things in media meant for the majority: articles on the abhorrent and loud anti-trans push in sports at every level, endless clinical reports on harassment and abuse in the locker rooms, even feel-good stories about people who are "different" but manage to compete. all things that need to be written about, maybe, but rarely are they handled on a personal level and doubly rare by those who despite it all understand the heart of an athlete.
but i wonder why it's so rare? i often think about "all stories are trans stories" in the sense that all stories are about transformation and the sometimes hilarious implications that that idea can lead to. but really there's something about sports with the inherent physical transformation that comes with activity, the manual transformations that participants enact on themselves in order to participate, the undesired transformation of assimilation that might be required to fit into ones team that makes sports a powerful medium for this kind of story.
stunning work by all involved, no other words needed to praise the technical excellence on display here