SHOOT: What people want to believe - South Africans anyway - is that despite appearances, Caster is what she claims to be. She may well be a woman, and I'm quite sure she is, but has she been sporting, has she been innocent in terms of her preparations? But who is interested in evidence; that is, hormone levels and performances that are out of sync with the progression in track athletics. You have to ask, when an athlete suddenly breaks records by jaw dropping margins, whether this is 'normal'. 3x the testosterone levels don't suggest 'normal'.
Preliminary medical tests on Caster Semenya, the 8-year-old South African at the centre of a gender row, have recorded elevated levels of the male hormone testosterone, Telegraph Sport can reveal.
A source close to the investigation into the 800 metres gold medallist has confirmed that tests carried out before the start of the World Championships indicated that the runner had three times the normal female level of testosterone in her body.
Telegraph Sport can also reveal that the head coach of the South African team is Dr Ekkart Arbeit, the former East German coach who was accused by a female athlete of giving her so many anabolic steroids that she was forced to undergo a sex-change operation and live the rest of her life as a man.
Although it is unclear how closely Arbeit has been working with Semenya, news of his position will raise concerns with the International Association of Athletics Federations.
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