Women's rowing team stealing contest (13)
I believe the answer is:
weightlifting
'contest' is the definition.
(sporting contest)
'women's rowing team stealing' is the wordplay.
'women' becomes 'w' (standard abbreviation).
'rowing team' becomes 'eight' (eight rowers).
'stealing' becomes 'lifting' (lifting is a kind of stealing).
'w'+'eight'+'lifting'='WEIGHTLIFTING'
(Other definitions for weightlifting that I've seen before include "Olympic event" , "Strongly-contested event" .)