The primary-of-its-kind ladies’s monitor occasion, ATHLOS, debuted on Thursday in New York Metropolis, created to deal with the dearth of visibility for monitor and area outdoors of the Olympics and for girls’s sports activities generally. The competing athletes weren’t the one ladies on the inaugural occasion working to make a distinction–feminine reporters, announcers, officers and influential friends additionally confirmed their assist. One explicit official current who has labored to create alternatives for girls was Canada’s Lisa Ferdinand–the first-ever feminine starter for a males’s Olympic 100m closing.
“She joins us right here to cap the evening—making historical past as our starter for the final race of the night: the ATHLOS 200m,” the announcer mentioned, honouring Ferdinand.
Ferdinand, an achieved technical official on the World Athletics Starter Panel, has achieved a collection of firsts throughout her profession within the male-dominated world of monitor officiating.
The Canadian has develop into an inspiration for girls all over the world as she promotes gender equality inside the sport and will increase the illustration of feminine technical officers in athletics. Ferdinand has labored to encourage ladies to hunt technical and administrative positions, administration roles, committees, and board positions, and she or he has expressed that extra could be finished to attain gender parity within the sport. Her position because the starter of the ultimate 200m occasion on the inaugural world-class women-only meet continues to affect and encourage ladies globally.
Introduction to officiating
Born in Montreal, Ferdinand started her profession in monitor and area in 1974 throughout her first yr of highschool. After operating cross-country, she grew to become set on sticking to a distance no farther than 400m. At 16, she represented Canada on the junior nationwide workforce, competing within the excessive soar, earlier than attending Rice College in Houston. Coached by Victor Lopez, the previous NACAC President, Ferdinand centered on the excessive soar, javelin and heptathlon.
In 1984, throughout her second yr of college, Ferdinand suffered a critical knee harm whereas throwing a javelin, requiring reconstructive surgical procedure, which led to an 18-month restoration course of. Regardless of the setback, the Montreal native persevered, shifting to Saskatchewan to coach with nationwide mixed occasions coach Lyle Sanderson, earlier than retiring from competitors in 1988.
To stay related to athletics, Ferdinand started officiating at native monitor meets, which shortly accelerated right into a profession as a technical official at world-class meets: the Commonwealth Video games, the Pan-American Video games, the World Athletics Championships and the Invictus Video games. “Officiating was not solely a method for me to present again, however to stay related to a sport that has given me a lot,” she advised World Athletics throughout an interview in 2022.
Accomplishments
Ferdinand was the primary girl and individual of color to function Board Chair for Athletics Ontario. In 2015, she grew to become the primary girl and first Canadian to be nominated to the World Athletics Starter Panel—considered one of six members assigned on a rotational foundation to main occasions just like the World Championships and Olympic Video games. In late 2022, Ferdinand was inducted into Canada’s Officers Wall of Fame.
At 62, Ferdinand continues to make strides in reaching gender equality. On the Paris 2024 Olympic Video games, the geologist and mom of three grew to become the primary girl in historical past to be named the starter for the boys’s 100m closing—the premier occasion on the highest stage of competitors in athletics. Her legacy will endure, creating alternatives for girls and establishing larger recognition for girls’s sports activities.
