The Official Strongman Games World Championships 2025 has stripped the title from the winner of the World’s Strongest Woman category over allegations that the contestant is a biological male and didn’t make that fact known before the event.

American competitor Jammie Booker was originally declared the winner over Britain’s Andrea Thompson at Arlington, Texas over the weekend after passing her in the standings in the final event.

Booker has not addressed questions about their sexual identity since the competition, but critics have uncovered a years-old YouTube video attributed to Booker where the athlete boasted of being transgender.

Official Strongman officials say they were unaware of Booker potentially being a biological male in a statement posted on Instagram. Event organizers say they were investigating but had been unable to get a hold of Booker since the event ended.

“Had we been aware, or had this been declared at any point before or during the competition, this athlete would not have been permitted to compete in the Woman’s Open category,” the post stated.

“We are clear — competitors can only compete in the category for the biological sex recorded at birth,” the post continued.

Officials said on Tuesday that they disqualified Booker and Ms. Thompson was declared the winner.

Ms. Thompson’s coach congratulated her in an Instagram post. “This win hasn’t come without controversy, but I want to make it very clear that while I support and applaud people for being who they want to be, sport is sport and the women’s classes exist for a reason,” Laurence Shahlaei said.

One sponsor dropped Booker in the aftermath of the competition. Iron Ape — which sells body building accessories — posted a statement on Facebook saying “Effective Immediately, Jammie Booker has been removed from the Iron Ape athlete roster and is no longer affiliated with our brand in any way.”

“We have reason to believe that Jammie Booker misrepresented critical information to OSG (Official Strongman Games) officials and judges, resulting in an unfair advantage over the other competitors in the Women’s Open class,” the company’s owner, Colton Cross went said.

A three-time champion of the World’s strongest Woman contest says trust in the sport could have been damaged by the incident.

Rebecca Roberts posted a “Protect Women’s Sports” image on Instagram and said, “Transgender women, people born male, should not be competing in the women’s category.”

“What happened this weekend wasn’t transparent. None of us knew. Not even the organisers (sic) knew. And when fairness is taken by surprise, trust in the sport begins to crack,” Ms. Roberts continued.