Were they really men? The secret of the legendary sisters of the press of the USSR team

Outrageous Caster Semenya, pumped up Serena Williams, suspicious Chinese athletes. It is only a small part of these athletes who have been accused of changing sex in order to improve their results. And they are far from being the first in the list of too masculine champions.

Enough gender scandals in Soviet history. One of the most publicized events happened with the press sisters. The athletes tore everyone apart in their disciplines and set record after record. And when the sex checks started, they disappeared.

War, Uzbekistan, Leningrad

May 10, 1937, Kharkiv. In the Jewish family of Natan Isaakovich and Tsili Vladimirovna Pressov, a daughter was born – Tamara. And exactly 1 year and 10 months later, the youngest Irina was born.

At the start of the Great Patriotic War, the family was evacuated to Samarkand. Upon arriving in the Uzbek SSR, my father immediately went to the front as a machine gunner, where he died in the summer of 1942. At that time, his daughters were already taking their first steps in athletics.

Tamara was the first to go the athletic route. Her general appearance and atypical powerful muscles helped her quickly get used to discus throwing and shot put: the girl almost immediately began to endure all her rivals in youth competitions. Young Irina decided to follow in the footsteps of Tamara and also became an athlete. Only not a pusher, but a runner. Although later she will try her hand at the “horse” pentathlon. Fortunately, the dimensions of the sisters were similar.

In 1957, the press athletes were bored: in Samarkand they were winning tournament after tournament, there was simply no competition. As a result, the coaches decided it was time for the sisters to be promoted. They wrote a letter to the famous specialist Viktor Alekseev, demanded the transfer of the pupils and sent them to the Leningrad school.

Two Olympics – five medals

Already in Leningrad, the press sisters conquered the All-Union level: Tamara won the USSR Championship in two disciplines at once and won the gold of the European Championship-58 in discus throwing, and Irina became a master of sports in hurdles and pentathlon. Just before the 1960 Olympics, she also set the first world record, earning 4880 points at the Dynamo All-Union Championship.

Success brought the two to the Summer Olympics in Rome. Debut Games are always unpredictable: even the most powerful beginner can fail there. But the sisters of the Press traveled around Italy like a skating rink. What is the conversation about when Irina repeated the world record and set the Olympic record already in the semifinals of the 80-meter hurdles? And in the final, she flew to her first gold medal, despite a bad start.

Tamara won two medals at once – gold in core and silver in discus. Four years later, she won the same number of awards. With a correction: this time, she won two gold medals. In the shot put, even the world record was broken – 18.4 m.

Irina also won gold at Tokyo-64. Only now in the pentathlon. With incredibly high scores – 5246 points. She could also compete for a medal in the core, but she ended up taking sixth place. However, two Olympic victories in a row, it’s wow. And if you add three more awards from Tamara + a bunch of joint records to this result, then it generally becomes scary. Including the public, who suspect the sisters of sexual scams.

“The career of an athlete has nothing to do with femininity”

As the press sisters ascended to the sporting Olympus, in the West their achievements were treated with caution. The main claim of the world media is the too masculine physique of the champions. Almost every press conference, athletes had to listen to a ton of questions regarding their appearance. And if Irina was not brought to provocations, then Tamara managed to get angry. Here, for example, is her response to one of the journalists: “I am a champion. And I am a woman. I think it’s noticeable. An athlete’s career has nothing to do with femininity.”

Well the Western media. So they didn’t like their athletes either! 1952 Olympic champion Galina Zybina admitted that she demanded the removal of the sisters from the press. She even sent a corresponding letter to the Central Committee with the team: “We wrote a letter, the team signed it. The national team doctor whispered, “Galina, fight to the end. I studied the documents, at the age of three, the press sisters underwent an operation … ”.

Sex change operation? In the Soviet Union in the 1940s? It sounds like crap. But some other champions believed it. Only now nothing came out of the collective slander: the press sisters were left in the national team, and those who signed the letter were expelled from it. And they lost their pay. “Where are they going? We need medals. But it’s still embarrassing. Especially when Alekseev called me immodest. Yes, it’s immodest to have set out to train these sisters! Markov, the coach -leader of the throwing team, refused to press. And Viktor Ilyich agreed. And he fell on me, although they had worked together since 1945. But that’s the kind of person he is. The main thing is the result, ”recalls Zybina in her book.

This case would therefore have remained in the dustbin of history. If not for one thing: in 1966, the sisters refused to participate in the European Championship. The one where women were forced to prove their gender.

“There was clearly something wrong with them.”

Gender injustice in sports has been denounced since the 1930s. Suspicions were mainly caused by intersex people – people with violations of the sexual development of the body. After checks, their sports results in women’s disciplines were often reviewed. German athlete Dora Ratjen was stripped of her 1938 high jump world record and recognized as a man named Heinrich, while Czech runner Zdena Koubkovova was stripped of all awards and banned from competing in the Olympics. Later, the 1934 women’s world record holder in the 800 meter race underwent gender correction surgery and became a man.

In the 1960s, suspicion reached a new level. The West believed that in women’s sports in the “Eastern bloc” (the USSR and the allied countries) there were too many divorced men. Therefore, the IOC introduced a mandatory genetic test. At the 1966 European Championship, the commission examined the authenticity of the athletes’ vagina and ensured that there was no penis, and at the 1968 Summer Olympics, a genetic test was been introduced. The medical examination was no longer as humiliating as it once was: athletes only had to take a smear from the oral cavity.

But the press sisters did not show up for any of the proceedings. Neither in 1966, nor at the 1968 Olympics. Although then they were at their peak: Tamara – 29 years old, Irina – 27 years old, on their total score – 26 different records and five Olympic medals. It is only now that the careers of both have come to an end. And the Soviet side argued that the introduction of genetic testing had nothing to do with this: the girls simply left the sport due to the abundance of injuries.

In the West, this version was not believed. Here is what sports doping historian John Hoberman wrote: “There was clearly something wrong with them. Whether men or steroid users, everyone asked this question then. At the same time, neither he nor the other skeptics have proof of guilt. Always.