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NOVEMBER 11, 2021 | The Jewish Home OctOber 29, 2015 | the Jewish Home
Holy Mission For Israeli Athlete Frum Bobsledder Hopes to Make History at Upcoming Winter Olympics By Steve Lipman
ovember is an important month for A.J. Edelman. That’s when Edelman, a day school graduate from Boston who made aliyah five years ago and competed for Israel in the skeleton event during the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea, begins a round of international qualification races for the 2022 Games in his new sport, bobsledding. And that’s when he gets to continue his annual, symbolic Chanukah candle-lighting tradition, which he began in 2016 in the German Alps near Adolf Hitler’s wartime winter resort, Berchtesgaden. If Edelman, the pilot on his four-man bobsled team, qualifies for next year’s Olympics in Beijing, it will mark Israel’s first appearance in that sliding event. And, if the qualifications go the way that he envisions, his team will make history in another way – the three pushers, who get the fiberglass sled off to a fast start then jump into the cramped vehicle’s trip down a nearly mile-long icy, brain-rattling, banked, twisting track at speeds approaching 80 mph, will be all Sabras; bobsled competitors for countries like Israel, whose tropical climates do not feature snowfall, typically come from more-temperate areas that include cold temperatures part of the year. One of Edelman’s anticipated teammates will be an Israeli Druze. Ward Fawarsy, Edelman says, will be, as far as he knows, the first Arab athlete to compete for Israel in a Winter Olympics. Another pusher, who served in the Israeli Army, is, like Edelman, shomer Shabbat – making them the first pair of Olympic competitors who will represent Israel at a Winter Olympics. The eclectic nature of Edelman’s bobsled team reflects his mission to show a more positive, more inclusive image of Israel than the Jewish state often receives abroad. “It’s the role of an Israeli athlete…. I’m on a holy mission,” he says. “I’m an agent of the state, an ambassador…a walking billboard for Israel. The responsibility is heavy.” As a “30 and single” Modern Orthodox Jew (he always wears a
kippa, a blue or grey knitted one) in an Olympic sport, albeit a minor one to most sports fans, Edelman is a one-man stereotype breaker – showing people by his presence, and his limited success so far, a side of Jews, and of Israel, which they rarely see. People who meet him, or hear his frequent public speeches, automatically make the connection with Jamacia’s storied bobsled team, whose unexpected, first appearance at the 1988 Winter Games at Calgary caught the fancy of fans – and non-sports-fans -- and became the subject of a popular 1993 movie. How do you say “Cool Runnings” in Hebrew? (Answer: Ritsot Magnivot.) The Jamaicans finished off the podium in 1988 – and in subsequent years that they qualified for the Games. Likewise, a medal is not a realistic goal for Edelman’s team in the Beijing Games, which begin on February 4, but may be a real possibility if he continues to compete, and qualify for, the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy, he says from his temporary base on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. Though he lives, when in Israel, in Netanya, he travels internationally during most of the year to train and compete at the dozen or so bobsled/skeleton/luge tracks in North America, Europe and Asia – a few weeks or months in one venue, then more in another. In his “nomadic” life, he and his teammates live in rented houses or RVs. He spent several recent months in the Greater New York area preparing for the 2022 Games, by sprinting and weightlifting, and by fund-raising for his team’s six-figure “shoestring” budget. His quixotic quest receives no financial support from Israel’s Olympic committee. Much of the team’s money, Edelman (bobteamisrael.com, Fb.com/bobteamisrael, GoFundMe.com/israelbobsled, adam.edelman@olympian. org) says, comes from “my pocket.” Edelman has brought a religious dimension to his athletic career. He began his candle-lighting tradition in 2015, outside of Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest resort, lighting his menorah while wearing the skintight, aerodynamic bobsled uniform that he designed. It features a Star of
