Italian sprinter to become first transgender woman to compete at Paralympics

BOLOGNA, Italy (AP) — Valentina Petrillo fell in love with athletics as a 7-year-old while watching Italian sprinter Pietro Mennea win gold in the 200 meters at the 1980 Moscow Olympics.

“I said I wanted to be like him,” said Petrillo, a transgender woman who was raised as a boy. “I wanted to put on the blue (Italy) shirt, I wanted to go to the Olympics. But — and there was a but — I wanted to do it as a woman because I didn’t feel like a man, I didn’t feel like myself.”

Four decades later...