Former chairperson of Boxing South Africa and an advocate of women's participation in sport Muditambi Ravele said she was heartbroken by the news that Olympic gold medalist Caster Semenya lost her court bid to challenge IAAF rules, forcing her to lower her testosterone levels to compete with women.

Ravele said she would advise Semenya to participate in other races except the specified disciplines from 400m to 1,500m, including the rarely run mile (about 1,609m).

“To me it is shocking. This will affect sports as a whole not just Caster. There is no scientific programme in place to show how they are going to do it (lower the testosterone). Secondly there is no proof that testosterone contributed to her [winning]. This thing will affect a lot of athletes; how are they going to judge athletes now?"

Every time an athlete is overperforming, are they going to check their testosterone? It is going to complicate sports as a whole. They have to define what is normal. If Caster runs other races, are they going to follow her again? If they had said they were going to apply this in all athletic codes then maybe we might have a different view. Now it shows that they are against her participation that’s why they specified the races she competes in. I would advise her to participate in other events and see what they would do,” she said.

She has already done that, only last week when she entered and won the 5,000m title in the SA track and field championships held at the Germiston Athletics Stadium.