One example is Judge Tom Chiola, an avid athlete since the 1980s on the playing fields of our gay sports groups. Competing in a triathlon or a Proud to Run, our city's first openly gay elected official has been intimately connected to the sports scene. Chiola and many like him have become leaders in our community and have also fought the stereotypes of gay men as not being "jocks."

And while gay men fight against their often-tortured adolescent experiences of being "last picked," lesbians often have to fight the opposite stereotype. Not all lesbians are jocks, and not all female jocks are lesbians.

In the 1960s and 1970s, lesbians and gays were competing in straight leagues, especially bowling, basketball and softball; they just may not have been "out" while doing it. But by the mid-to-late 1970s, gay and lesbian bars were bolder in their sponsorship of teams. Jan Berger played softball for the Ladybug bar team in a Chicago park, where two-thirds of the teams were made up of lesbians.

Berger, Peg Grey and Jackie Fabri decided to start a league in the late 1970s. The men already had a gay 16-inch softball league that was founded in 1978 as the Gay Athletic Association. By 1983, women's softball was part of GAA. Women's volleyball started that fall ( the Swan Club had had a team in the Park District leagues ) , and women's flag football began in 1988. The league changed into the Metropolitan Sports Association and is now known as the Chicago Metropolitan Sports Association. More than 30 years later, CMSA is among the largest gay sports organizations in the world, with thousands of members and dozens of sports leagues.

Parallel to CMSA's founding was the creation of a more sports-and-social group, the Lincoln Park Lagooners, incorporated in 1977. LPL, which continues to operate in 2008, held massive community events like Cruisin' the Nile in the 1970s, and it hosts social and recreational sports, primarily for men.

Other organizations that started in the 1980s and early 1990s include the Windy City Athletic Association, with key backing by Jim Flint, featuring softball, basketball and other sports, and the Women's Sports Association, founded by Peg Grey and others to create additional opportunities for women, especially across all skill levels. WSA operated from 1993 to 2008 ( Grey died in 2007 ) , but another group, Women Playing Sports Association, is taking its place. The competition between the leagues, especially for standing within national sports events, has at times been fierce, and even more political than an aldermanic election battle.

Chicago's lesbian softball was among a handful of women's teams present at the first North American Gay Amateur Athletic Alliance women's tournaments, sending CMSA's Irene's Diamonds. Chicago has continued to be well-represented in NAGAAA with teams such as the WCAA Synergy women, among the winningest teams in history. CMSA's Sidetrack and WCAA's Annex men's teams have also had long winning records. The Nubians, an all-African-American women's team in CMSA, has garnered strong attention locally and nationally for its performance and spirit. Several Chicagoans are in the NAGAAA Hall of Fame.

CMSA's strength has been its long-term commitment to fielding a wide range of sports. At its core are softball, flag football, bowling and volleyball, but it has also been strong in other sports and most recently has added soccer and badminton. When it first incorporated as GAA on Dec. 31, 1979, Sam Molinaro was board president, joined by fellow board members Alex Bell, Dan DiLeo, Karen Dillion, Gail Parzygnat, Angelo Rios, Joyce Rzeppa, Kerry Sabinske and Tyrone Sinclair. Art Johnston was also a key early member, and Marcia Hill, 2008 board president, has served the organization for many years as player, official and board member. Dick Uyvari has also been a critical part of CMSA, organizing bowling and being part of national and local bowling tournaments ( including the 1983 hosting of the International Gay Bowlers Organization tournament and bowling events at the 2006 Gay Games ) . CMSA founded and hosted the first annual Chicago Pride Week Invitational bowling tournament.

In 2007, CMSA hosted its first Hall of Fame induction. Those honored were Peg Grey ( who had just died from cancer at age 61 ) , Dick Uyvari, Sam Molinaro, Jimmy McKinzey and Marcia Hill. As of 2008, CMSA had 3,100 members. Both CMSA and WCAA have hosted national tournaments in Chicago for softball, volleyball and basketball, and they have sent teams to tournaments around the country.

The Chicago area's longtime sports groups also include the 9 to 12 League for bowlers in the northwest suburbs and the Frontrunners/ Frontwalkers ( FR/FW ) running chapter. While individuals initially started the Proud to Run annual race for charity as part of the CMSA, eventually the race and walk came under the Frontrunners umbrella. The group is well-known for its award-winning refreshment stop along the annual Chicago Marathon route. FR/FW officially started in July 1982 after the success of that first pride run. Peg Grey, Rob Williams and Jim White established the Frontrunners club out of that race. It is part of an international network of Frontrunners clubs; the name comes from the gay track novel The Front Runner by Patricia Nell Warren.

Other recreational groups have thrived in Chicago, some involving sweat; some, brains; and some, both. A long-running bridge club provides a great social outlet. Two exciting additions to the scene in recent years are cheer and performance groups: the Chicago Spirit Brigade and the R.O.T.C., or Righteously Outrageous Twirling Corps. Both have performed all over the city and country and were featured in the Gay Games in Chicago. There have been square dancing groups, and the popular drag Chi-Town She-Devils in beards and hoop skirts. The Illinois Gay Rodeo Association also hosts a popular annual gay rodeo event in the Chicago suburbs.

Besides Proud to Run, Chicago athletes have stepped up for other charitable events, especially those focused on AIDS in the 1980s and 1990s. These include the Strike Against AIDS annual bowling benefits at Marigold Bowl, aerobathons, AIDS Walks, AIDS Rides, roller-skating parties at Rainbo Roller Rink, golf benefits and more. CMSA established Athletes Against AIDS in 1987, helping to pay the dues for members with AIDS.

CMSA and other sports leagues have been volunteer-run for decades, relying on hundreds of people to pull off complicated and time-consuming tasks. The leagues have survived because of the generosity of their team sponsors, which have been mostly gay and lesbian bars, especially in the early years.

Well before Chicago thought of bidding to host Gay Games VII in 2006, Chicagoans were part of the international Gay Games movement. Peg Grey was the first female co-president of the Federation of Gay Games, and Team Chicago has been a strong local partner for the Federation. Grey, Uyvari and Dave Irvin were early Team Chicago leaders helping to put Chicago on the sports map. In recent years, Team Chicago has pulled existing sports and cultural events under the umbrella of the Midwest GLBT Sports and Cultural Festival.

What is also important is that openly gay teams compete in mainstream leagues. This has included Chicago's women's and men's rugby teams, as well as soccer and men's ice hockey teams of the present. Straights and gays play together on the teams, but the teams are promoted as "gay" for all their competitors to see.

Eventually, Chicago's sports infrastructure was strong enough to host Gay Games VII in 2006. Thousands of the city's athletes volunteered to help during the Gay Games, while others competed in events. Many in the cultural community also joined in, singing with choirs, playing with the bands or performing at other events.

Chicago is a sports town, from the Bears to the Cubs and White Sox, the Bulls to the Blackhawks and Wolves. For women there are the Chicago Force pro football team and the Sky pro basketball team. There is pro softball in the suburbs, and possibly there will be a return of pro soccer for women—to match the Fire men's team. Many great college teams are in the region, with fanatic alumni to fill their arena seats. Some of these teams, including the Cubs, Sox, Fire, Force and Sky, are very open now about their gay fans and have hosted gay events. The Cubs donated Wrigley Field for the Gay Games. And Soldier Field, where the Bears play the macho sport of football, was rented out for the Opening Ceremony.

Sports have come a long way for gay men and women. Pushed ahead by Title IX, women have taken a huge leap forward in the past three decades. Gay men, meanwhile, have fought against stereotypes and achieved great honors. Two former Chicagoans have helped play a role in all of this: pro football player Dave Kopay, who came out in the 1970s, and tennis legend Billie Jean King, who came out strong in the 1980s after earlier being outed. Kopay was back for the Gay Games, proud of his home town. King was honorary co-chair for establishing the Center on Halsted and showed her excitement on her return when the space opened in 2007.

Athletes are not just jocks. In the gay and lesbian community, they have helped to change the world.

From Out and Proud in Chicago: An Overview of the City's Gay Community, edited by Tracy Baim, Surrey Books, 2008.