The logical next step for widescreen gaming monitors is a model that can display the equivalent of two UHD (3,840 x 2,160) screens — and Samsung teased just such a thing earlier this year at CES 2023. Now, the Odyssey Neo G9 model has a price and release date, arriving in October 2023 for $2,500, Samsung announced. 

That's about what you'd pay for two really nice 4K monitors, but the price seems justified. It's a mini-LED with HDR 1000 support, meaning it offers 1,000 nits of peak brightness (or around 450 nits total on average) and 10-bit color processing, along with a 240Hz refresh rate, 1ms response time, two HDMI 2.1 ports, one HDMI 2.0 port and a DisplayPort 2.1 input. Buyers will also get AMD's FreeSync Premium Pro variable refresh rate and of course an incredibly wide 57-inch (32:9) 7,680 x 2,160 aspect ratio with a fairly extreme 1000R curvature. 

It comes with picture-in-picture and picture-by-picture, giving you multiple inputs at a glance. Other features include an ergonomic stand, plus Core Lighting+ and CoreSync that offers ambient lighting working in unison with games and other visuals. 

Samsung talked up the value of DisplayPort 2.1, which has three times the bandwidth of DisplayPort 1.4 and allows for 4K 240Hz gaming. It has only been announced or seen on a handful of displays to date. The only way to make use of it so far, though, would be with AMD's latest Radeon RX 7900XT and RX 7900XTX GPUs (or its pro W7000 cards) — as the standard is nowhere to be found on NVIDIA's latest RTX 4000 series cards. 

As such, driving such a display at anywhere near the top specs for gaming would require an expensive PC setup. The monitor would be useful for other purposes, though, like as an incredible multi-tasking productivity display or a versatile content creation monitor (if you can handle the curve). As mentioned, it arrives in the US in October for $2,500. 

Bridges had hoped to aim for a spot in the Paris Olympics. Now she’ll spend her time advocating for trans rights.

Emily Bridges has been cycling competitively for much of her life, first in the male category and then, as she has transitioned, she has hoped to compete in the female category.

She had aimed to qualify for the 2024 Summer Olympic Games and represent Great Britain — she’s from Wales — on the international stage.

Now, as she writes in Vogue, she is leaving the sport that has meant so much to her.

Why? British Cycling has banned most trans women from the female category, and Union Cycliste Internationale — the world governing body for the sport — has done the same.

To be sure, she could — by the rules — compete in the “open” category. Yet after a couple years of hormone replacement therapy, there is simply no way she could be competitive at the elite level against cisgender men. Particularly as she continues on the therapy, depriving her body of processing testosterone, her ability to earn a spot on a men’s Olympic team is truly impossible.

HRT does in fact reduce a trans woman’s athletic capability.

Yet beyond that, Bridges, like so many other trans athletes, feels that being pushed out of the female category — where she feels she belongs — isn’t emotionally sustainable.

It’s something we’ve heard recently from U.S. champion and Olympic hopeful Nikki Hiltz, a trans nonbinary runner who knows that someday their participation in the female category could become emotionally and mentally problematic.

“Right now, competing in the women’s category still feels OK for me and my gender and where I’m at with that journey,” Hiltz said this week. “But the second it doesn’t, I’m not going to sacrifice myself for my sport. I’m going to choose the relationship with myself before my relationship with track and field.”

With the number of youth who increasingly identify as nonbinary or transgender, if you think this topic is going away, or is going to be easily solved with some bans, you’re sorely mistaken.

To be clear, Bridges never actually competed in the female category. The bans were handed down shortly before she was able to start her competitive cycling career as a woman.

Unable emotionally and physically to compete in the male or “open” category, and now banned at the highest levels from the female category, Bridges is walking away from competition all together.

“Cycling competitively was my life for the past 12 years,” she wrote. “But now, I’m divesting from the sport – I have to.”

This is not what anyone should want. Yet increasingly we will see trans women leave sport all together where they are banned from the female category at any level, including at the highest levels swimming, track and field, and rugby.

For her part, Bridges has been an exceedingly thoughtful voice in the conversation about trans inclusion in sports. I have found her to be a voice of reason through so much noise.

While she’ll still be pushing for trans inclusion in her sport, it’s heartbreaking that she has felt the need to walk away from competition.

That it’s this young woman — thoughtful, considerate — who is caught in the middle of this is so unfortunate.

One sport — swimming — is trying to find a path that builds more opportunities to compete, creating an “open” category where trans athletes can compete without transition requirements.

How will it work? Brynn Tannehill, an important voice advocating for trans rights and inclusion, is rightfully dubious given the likely low number of competitors FINA is likely to attract.

Imagine being the only swimmer “competing” in an empty pool? I imagine that could feel quite embarrassing.

The New York Marathon is one that has successfully created a third nonbinary category, where athletes are thriving.

Will a third gendered (or non-gendered) category take hold in sports, with enough interest to create meaningful competition? It will be an area of focus for many in the coming years.

Still, I have long maintained that every trans woman should have a path to participate in the female category. I appreciate different governing bodies are still figuring out what that looks like. One, two, three years of HRT? Gender-reassigment surgery? A change in government ID? The number of different ideas smart, educated people have on how to include trans women in the female category are as diverse as our community.

That’s a good thing, as different sports, and different level of sport, require a variety of considerations.

All-out bans? No.

Effectively chasing people out of sports is the logical conclusion to bans, and I’ve talked to too many trans athletes who share how validated they feel competing against people of their gender.

I’m not afraid of trans women winning. I do think that there should be medical-transition requirements for them to compete in the female category, and at the higher levels those requirements can be high bars.

Give them the opportunity to clear those bars. Build systems that celebrate all the athletes looking to compete and win. Create more opportunities to compete.

I hope we eventually get to see Bridges hop in a bicycle to compete at some point down the road.

An archer made famous for her footwork did just that to retrieve her bags when Southwest Airlines claim they couldn’t be found – despite the fact they were stuck in Kansas City.

Social Media Fans Help Reunite Archer with Her Bows

Orissa Kelly makes her money with her bow and legs as one of the most accomplished foot archers in the world. According to her account on TikTok, the performer was traveling from Kansas City International Airport (MCI) to Nashville International Airport (BNA) aboard Southwest Airlines, checking her archery bag. While she made it safe to Music City, her archery bag did not arrive.

She says when she went to file a claim with the airline, a Southwest employee told her that it was hopelessly lost and could not be recovered. Instead of being reunited, she would need to file a claim for reimbursement.

The airline didn’t know that the bag had an Apple AirTag in it, allowing her to locate the bag back in Kansas City. She claims she tried to call Southwest multiple times, but nobody was willing to help.

@orissakelly Shoutout to my incredible followers that helped out today. Not cool @Southwest Airlines #fail #airport #drama #lostluggage #southwestairlines #ohno #fyp ♬ Oh No – Kreepa

With information in her hand and resolve, Kelly turned to social media to ask for help. She made a plea on her Instagram account asking for anyone who works at the airport for help. Her request was answered by a “ton of followers.” Working with one of them, she was able to pinpoint the exact spot where her luggage was at the airport and get it on an airplane to Nashville.

In her TikTok short, she was thankful to her followers for helping, and slammed Southwest for not helping her despite having helpful information. She blamed the airline for missing a show and her pay for that appearance, as well as not reimbursing her for airport parking for the multiple trips she needed to make.

AirTags Becoming More Popular for Luggage Recovery

This is not the first time in 2023 a flyer credited an AirTag for getting luggage back. In January 2023, one flyer recovered her bag from United Airlines after the carrier told them they could not get the luggage back.

Get the best tips for flying Southwest Airlines on the FlyerTalk Forums. 

Trolls are piling on Rapinoe following her World Cup penalty kick miss. We choose gratitude for all the incredible moments she’s given us.

Megan Rapinoe has had a rough couple of days.

Ever since her penalty kick miss played a significant role in the USWNT’s elimination at the FIFA Women’s World Cup, a seemingly endless online troll parade has made her into the symbol of the team’s failure this year.

If you search “Megan Rapinoe” on Twitter, it’s like asking, “Hey Siri, show me what it looks like when the internet’s worst people are happy.” I never knew so many eagle avatars rooted for the USA to fail.

Even former President Donald Trump weighed in, taking a victory lap while America lost and leveling a bit of smack talk in Rapinoe’s direction. Clearly he has nothing else going on.

As I wrote a few months ago, when Pride pisses off the right people, that means it’s doing its job. Based on the type of people who are celebrating one of Rapinoe’s few public defeats, she’s one of the greatest representatives of Pride in sports history.

Instead of destroying her reputation, the alt-right backlash only serves to affirm it.

These politically motivated attacks were inevitable after Rapinoe willingly accepted the mantle of athlete activist, fighting back against Trump during the USWNT’s victorious World Cup run in 2019, advocating for transgender rights, and kneeling during the national anthem to protest systemic racism.

That it took these agents of hackdom years to find a single opportunity to attack Rapinoe is a measure of just how dominant and brilliant her career has been. The Olympic Games happen more frequently than Rapinoe failures.

Photo credit should read Chris Putnam/Future Publishing via Getty Images

Which is why now is the time it’s important to remember and celebrate all the greatness she’s given us over the course of her career, even as we grieve the USWNT’s loss.

At a time when Rapinoe’s harshest critics are proclaiming their vindication, the best way for her fans to fight back is to choose gratitude.

Yes, the USWNT’s lackluster play was dispiriting to watch over the last month, and the results of this World Cup were alternately depressing and maddening. It’s OK to feel those emotions in the wake of such a stunning disappointment.

But that one moment can’t be allowed to overshadow Rapinoe’s record of athletic brilliance or the incredible joy she inspired through her legendary play on the pitch.

Indeed, if you search “Megan Rapinoe top plays” on Youtube, you’ll find there are even more inspirational highlights than there are soul crushing trolls on Twitter.

There’s so much to be grateful for. Start with one of the greatest assists in US Soccer history from the 2011 World Cup Quarterfinal, when Rapinoe rescued the USWNT with a cross sent from heaven that set up Abby Wambach’s game-tying header against Brazil only seconds away from defeat.

The very next year, Rapinoe helped the USWNT to the gold medal at the London 2012 Summer Olympic Games with the first-ever Olympic olimpico. With one alliterative corner kick, she made history and poetry…

As if that wasn’t enough, at the Tokyo Games, she did it again.

Of course, it’s impossible to speak of gratitude-inspiring Rapinoe moments without mentioning her rampage through the 2019 World Cup. From the moment she unveiled The Pose after a goal against host nation France to her penalty kick score that gave the US a lead it would not relinquish in the Final, the Golden Boot and Golden Ball winner put her signature on the tournament like few players before or since.

When it comes to assembling a montage of Rapinoe’s greatest accomplishments on the world stage, the most transcendent moments are easy to find and hard to narrow down.

One of the paradoxes in sports is that the more accomplishments a star athlete accumulates in their career, the more fans become jaded by additional greatness and infuriated by any defeats. It’s one of the least-fun parts of watching games and makes being part of a fan community an exercise in frustration with the worst parts of human nature.

Add in the backlash she’s now facing largely from conservatives and it’s understandable that this is a very difficult moment for Rapinoe. That’s why choosing gratitude is not only better for our mental health as fans but also the best way to shout down the cacophony of howling nonentities who are trying to dim her light.

Fortunately, it’s not difficult to find reasons to be grateful for Rapinoe when her entire career is a gratitude journal.

Two governing bodies sent a harsh, clear message of exclusion to trans athletes.

In the last week, the world governing bodies of professional cycling and disc golf decided to write new rules for transgender athletes in the female category: When transgender women win, we reserve the right to deny your success, your identity and your humanity.

Union Cycliste Internationale announced that transgender women will have to compete in a “men’s/open” category and are barred from the female category. The catalyst behind was the recent success of Austin Killips. Since a breakthrough effort at last year’s USA Cycling Cyclocross Nationals and a cyclocross season in Europe, she took her show on the road to the Tour of the Gila in New Mexico in May.

The Disc Golf Pro Tour has shown much of the same anti-transness.

The running battle between that organization and transgender touring pro Natalie Ryan went from the course to the courtroom twice this season. The legal actions were in response to the Professional Disc Golf Association and the DGPT denying her a place in the Female Professional Open division after Ryan’s two event wins in 2022.

Then the Tour escalated the situation by cancelling the FPO division at five tournaments. Four of the tournaments affected are based in the U.S., along with one in Canada.

The common denominator? Each of those tournaments were held in areas that uphold transgender rights, and where Ryan stands a good chance of winning a court challenge.

DGPT

DGPT CEO Jeff Spring cited “fairness” as the reason for the policy and changing the schedule, but Ryan didn’t buy any of it.

“If the concern is that cis women won’t earn as much money, the solution is not guaranteeing none of them will make any,” she said via Instagram. “This is not Natalie Ryan’s fault.”

The decision frustrated a trans pioneer in the sport. This past weekend Kelly Jenkins, the PDGA’s first out trans competitor, won her age division at PDGA Masters World Championships in Arizona.

The win for her was somewhat overshadowed by the actions of the DGPT to keep Ryan out of the women’s competition and brought back harsh memories navigating her own transition while living in a place where it wasn’t accepted.

“In Tennessee I was refused service in a restaurant because I’m trans and was asked to leave an LGBT bar for having the audacity to use the women’s restroom,” she continued. “We need politicians and lawmakers on our side to make sure all the states protect us leaving the DGPT nowhere to run.”

Both of these national and international governing bodies, as have FINA, World Athletics and many others who called for blanket bans, claim they are basing their policy on proof that their previous rules on limits to testosterone still yield an “unfair advantage” for transgender women in the female category.

Yet none of these organization will acknowledge research such as the 2022 report of the Canadian Center for Ethics in Sport or the newly published study by a group of Australian researchers led by noted endocrinologist Dr. Ada Cheung and athlete-advocate Kirsti Miller.

Their work goes even deeper in contesting the claims of “permanent insurmountable advantage” for transgender women in sports.

What seems to get the attention of the governing bodies? Those who have used transphobia as their post-sports retirement plan.

Consider the examples of former college swimmer Riley Gaines, who is building her name and brand demeaning Lia Thomas, or a cyclist Hannah Arensman, who contends finishing behind Killips at USA Cycling Cyclocross Nationals last year led her to retire.

Such talk gnaws at Killips’ coach, former professional racer and five-time national masters champion Adam Myerson.

“What upsets me most is that trans women are never allowed any agency,” he said. “Any success or failure they have is viewed through the lens of being trans only, ignoring any hard work or sacrifice or any of the thousands of things that go into sports performance.”

Myerson’s thoughts, and the hurt that comes with it, mirror my own. It’s a hurt that comes in part from being a trans person in a time when people debate, question or try to outlaw my existence.

Where exactly is the “fairness” in following every rule and then being held in contempt and under suspicion because you won?

Is it “fair” for me and mine to check our identity and humanity at the starting line? To quote two-time UCI track cycling champion Dr. Veronica Ivy via Instagram, “The UCI has said loud and clear that trans women are not real women and that we must be treated as other, and the cis women must be ‘protected’ from us innocent trans women. It’s an indignity. It’s inhumane. It’s disgusting.”

Valentina Petrillo, after three years of training hard and fighting her national federation for her chance to run fast, won two bronze medals at the World Para Athletic Championships last week.

Would it be “fair” for her to perhaps be held out of next year’s Paralympics because she is trans and fast enough to contend for a medal?

Tour of the Gila

Austin Killips winning a bicycle race makes some folks uncomfortable. Natalie Ryan peering in the distance with the basket in sight and a 2-shot lead? Some people don’t like that.

If you don’t think it's a matter of discomfort, I’d invite you to read some of the comment sections on stories about their success, or what certain transphobes leave on the social media of these transgender athletes or any trans person.

How many times has a Killips, Ryan or any other trans woman in sports who succeeds been called “cheater,” misgendered willfully, or have to deal with certain creepy cisgender people speculating on their medical status and/or their genitalia? How exactly is this “fair”?

This isn’t a “fairness” issue, especially when fairness and humanity of me and mine are left out of the discussion. As a transgender people and as athletes we are tired of being the scapegoat for that discomfort.