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Last update - 19:14 12/07/2009
18th Maccabiah
'Time to move on'
By Dan Goldberg, Sydney
Tags: Israel News, Maccabiah 
Some 34 survivors of the '97 Maccabiah disaster - when a bridge over the Yarkon River collapsed, killing four and injuring dozens of Australian athletes - will be attending the 18th Games. Among them are children of the victims, and a record-breaking golfer

When the legions of athletes participating in the 18th Maccabiah swarm into the national stadium in Ramat Gan for the opening ceremony on July 13, few in the 40,000-plus capacity arena will have heard of Roy Vandersluis, a 62-year-old Australian golfer, who is competing in his ninth consecutive Maccabiah.

Vandersluis will be marching in the opening parade along with approximately 7,000 athletes from some 60 countries, as well a plethora of international superstars including English soccer legend Sir Bobby Charlton, who will lead Team GB, and seven-time Olympic swimming medalist Jason Lezak, the poster boy of the American team.

But in at least one respect, Vandersluis will very much be in a league of his own: None of his other fellow athletes has competed in every single Maccabiah since 1977. Indeed, although Maccabi World Union (MWU) archivist Ronny Dror was unable to confirm that this accomplishment is definitely unprecedented since 1932, when the Jewish Olympics were established, he told Haaretz: "As far as I know, this is a record."
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Bernie Gold, Maccabi Australia's official historian for the past 25-plus years, is sure of one thing. "It's definitely an Australian record, but we also believe it's a world record," says Gold, who first competed at the 1965 Games. "I believe Roy will be creating Games history. It's a fantastic achievement."

Adds Tom Goldman, head of the Australian delegation and a member of the MWU executive: "We don't believe there is anyone else and MWU is quite prepared to stand by the statement that he is the only athlete on record to have competed in nine consecutive Maccabiahs."

There are, however, several people who've been at more Maccabiah Games, but not consecutively and not as competitors. Goldman is attending his 10th Maccabiah, which he has attended in various capacities - as a competitor, administrator and even spectator - since his first in 1969. This is the ninth Games for another Australian, veteran administrator Louis Platus, but only his second as a competitor. In 1973, he played on the cricket team, which lost the gold-medal match against South Africa by one run. Now Platus is competing in lawn bowls - 36 years after he attended his first Maccabiah. British soccer player David Kyte will be competing in his seventh consecutive Maccabiah, as will Peter Lazard, who has represented both Britain and South Africa.

Leaders of Maccabi organizations abroad who were contacted could not name anyone who has matched Vandersluis' 32-year stint. That leaves Vandersluis, an antiques dealer who was born in London and is now based in Sydney, in uncharted territory.

"I had such a good time in 1977, I always said I'd keep going to the Maccabiah Games provided I was chosen, and unless I was dead or bankrupt," he told Haaretz. "Meeting fabulous people over the years and traveling to their countries - you just make very, very good friendships. I always remember thinking this is an experience I've got to make happen every four years."

Of his record-breaking run, Vandersluis says: "I don't know anybody who's competed in nine. It's a pretty good innings. I suppose golf is one of the few sports you can play that long."

Next over the bridge

Like many members of the Australian delegation, he is a survivor of 1997's 15th Maccabiah bridge disaster, which claimed the lives of four members of his team: Greg Small, 37, and Yetty Bennett, 50, died at the site after a makeshift bridge over the Yarkon River collapsed, plunging the Australian team into its polluted waters as they attempted to make their way to the opening ceremony; Warren Zines, 54, and Elizabeth Sawicki, 47, succumbed weeks later from the poisonous toxins they ingested. At the time, Vandersluis was captain of the golf team, which was marching behind the tenpin bowling team.

"I was talking to [tenpin bowlers] Elizabeth Sawicki and Greg Small just before they died," he recalls. "I was the very, very next person to go on the bridge, but I had an Israeli soldier's hand on my chest saying 'enough.' He stopped me and all the golfers. I stood there and watched it before my eyes. The people right in front of me were dead. It could have been me. The experience was pretty horrible. When I saw people in the water, I thought they could be drowning because all the scaffolding was skewered into the water, and that's when I realized there were people under that. It was pretty dramatic."

Dozens of others were injured, some very seriously. Sasha Elterman, a 15-year-old tennis player, underwent more than 30 brain and lung operations after she swallowed the toxins. Now 27, she has recovered and is working in Sydney as a personal trainer. The Maccabiah continued after a day of mourning and, remarkably, Australia won 19 gold medals - its largest-ever haul since the first Aussie - tennis player Elias Honig - competed in the 1950 Games.

The fallout from the disaster scarred the otherwise robust relationship between Israel and Australia that dates back to World War I, when Australian soldiers were fighting the Turks in Palestine. Outrage and acrimony prevailed in the immediate aftermath of the disaster.

Four years later, with the wounds still raw, despite the fact that four officials convicted of criminal negligence were sentenced to jail, a skeleton team of only 60 Australians competed at the 16th Maccabiah in 2001 after an official boycott was lifted at the 11th hour. When the 2005 Games rolled around, millions of dollars in compensation had been pledged to the families of the victims, and time was beginning to heal the wounds.

More than 500 Australians - 34 of them survivors of '97 - returned to Israel to participate in or attend the 17th Maccabiah, even though some were still rankled by the presence of the chairman of the organizing committee of the '97 Games, Yoram Eyal, who was still manager of the Kfar Hamaccabiah village and sat on the executive of MWU. He had done his six months of community service for his part in the disaster. An official ceremony was held at the bridge, attended by representatives of three of the four victims' families. As Yetty Bennett's son Mark summed it up: "It is time to move on. I think Mum would be happier if I did."

For the survivors, what mattered most at that point was not competing, but completing the march into the stadium. It was cathartic, and many said they felt it brought some form of closure.

Tom Goldman, who was president of Maccabi Australia in '97, believes the 2005 Games marked a new beginning. "We will never forget [the disaster] - neither will MWU, neither will the organizing committee. It is remembered at every Maccabiah and accorded the same 'honor' as the Munich massacre. But we are moving on."

Fourth-largest team

This year, about 420 Australians - the fourth-largest team behind Israel, America and Britain - will march into the opening ceremony in the presence of Israeli President Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Among them will be Greg Small's son Josh, himself a tenpin bowler, who will speak at an official ceremony on July 10 at the site of the permanent memorial to the four victims from '97. He was just 7 when his father died - a crushing fact he learned from the news on TV.

Ever since then, Josh Small says he has had a dream: "I want to continue what my father did, continue his legacy. I've got mixed emotions, I'll be happy to go, but it'll be sad too."

Nowadays, when he bowls in tournaments the 19-year-old wears his dad's shirt and red pants from those ill-fated Games. Josh's mother Suzanne, also a tenpin bowler, was injured at the 1997 Games as well. She suffered a dislocated shoulder, five fractures in her ankle and swelling around the heart, and watched as her husband's body was pulled from the river. Returning to the site will be an emotional roller coaster for her. "It's like I'm visiting my husband's grave," she says. But she'll be proud to see her son march into the stadium. "Josh always had a goal to follow in his dad's footsteps. He had no privileges; his dreams have finally come true."

Alongside Josh will be about 50 survivors of the '97 disaster. Among them Judy Kohn and Raie Moss - identical 55-year-old twins, who are attending their seventh Maccabiah.

"We've always been to the Games together," says Moss. "We just love the experience. To compete at a Maccabiah is the pinnacle of what you can achieve as a Jewish athlete unless you compete at the Olympics. To qualify is really special. It's not that easy."

Along with the old guard of Roy Vandersluis, Louis Platus, Tom Goldman and Bernie Gold - who will become only the fourth Australian to receive the Yakir Maccabi Award during these Games - are a slew of new Australian athletes.

"There are more than 150 first-timers to the Maccabiah," explains Lisa Borowick, the team's general manager, adding that almost 150 have dropped out because of the global financial crisis. "A lot of athletes canceled because they're nervous about their jobs and they're reluctant to take leave for three weeks, let alone the cost factor. Also, it's been harder to find sponsors, and the weakness of the Australian dollar certainly played a part."

One of the highest-profile athletes who'yll be missing is table-tennis player David Zalcberg: The Athens and Beijing Olympian was forced to withdraw because he'll be in the midst of his internship at a hospital in Melbourne. Outstanding cricketer Michael Klinger has also pulled out, following his selection to play on the Australia A team.

"Certainly they were the highest caliber athletes we were taking, but we have a wonderful group," says Borowick. "We [have] realistic medal chances in ... netball, tennis, lawn bowls, squash and table tennis, and we have some outstanding swimmers."

Maccabi Australia has selected Vandersluis as their flag bearer to lead them into the stadium, in recognition of his world-record-breaking achievement. It's an honor he was also afforded at the 1993 Games. Since he first competed in 1977, Vandersluis has won two bronze team medals (in 1989 and 2001) and one individual silver (in 1989). Now he's hoping to go one better: He was just one shot behind going into the final hole of the final round at Israel's only 18-hole golf course in 1989.

"My opponent Todd Shore hit his tee shot into the next fairway and came back almost over the club house and hit it on the very front of the green," he recalls. "I hit two of my very best shots to about five feet from the pin."

Shore had a massive 50-foot putt. If he had missed, Vandersluis could have forced a playoff, he says: "He sunk his putt. It was pretty devastating. I thought he was going to three putt and I'd one putt and win."

With a handicap of 2.7, the lowest he's had for a while, Vandersluis believes he has a chance for gold this time. But he won't have any advantage over his rivals, despite his quadrennial visits to Caesarea. "Believe it or not," he says, "they've actually revamped the whole course, which I knew blade of grass by blade of grass."

After a $7 million makeover, the course, which was founded by the Rothschild family in 1961, reopened on May 1. "There's not even one hole the same as it used to be. It means I'll be playing a new course," says Vandersluis.

Looking back over his 32-year odyssey, he singles out his second Maccabiah, in 1981, when he played in a pack that included American Corey Pavin, who was 21 at the time and went on to win the U.S. Open in 1995: "I was running first or second up until the final round and had a bad last round. I was playing with American Joel Hirsch in the last round when he won into a playoff against Corey." For the record, Pavin prevailed and won the gold.

"Joel and I have become the closest of friends ever since 1981," says Vandersluis. "We try and meet every year. He only ever plays the Maccabiah. Corey was a brilliant golfer."

Vandersluis may not have won the U.S. Open, but he has his own illustrious history: In 1958, at the age of 11, he became the first junior member of Monash Golf Club, which was opened by Jews in Sydney in 1950 because they were largely excluded from establishment clubs. Now a member of the prestigious Lakes Golf Club, Vandersluis has won the championship three times there and was selected for the New South Wales state squad in 1988. He's also played tournaments in far-flung places like Denmark and Bermuda.

Looking to the future, he says: "Right now I'm probably playing as good golf as I've played in the last 10 years, so I feel like I can go on for another two Maccabiahs. I'd recommend it to anybody. It's a wonderful experience."

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