Superstar Gerber sweeps board with EIGHT golds
JCC GAMES Winning a gold medal at a sporting championship is the dream of every competitor…but what must it be like to win EIGHT.
Just ask Maccabi Team GB swimmer Yaron Gerber, who entered 12 events at the JCC Games in the USA last week and won a medal in every one of them ¬ in the week of his 15th birthday.
Apart from those golds, 6ft 1in Yaron added four silvers to his tally for good measure. And Yaron was not the only golden boy among the swimmers. His team-mate Daniel Shindler also collected a bucketful, four golds three silvers and a bronze.
The GB squad ended the games with a brilliant tally of 108 medals - 42 golds, 41 silvers and 25 bronze.
“It was a resounding success for our team,” said Head of Delegation Brian Green.
“We took 77 youngsters who competed in nine sports. Everyone enjoyed it and had a wonderful time. There were some fantastic performances. Who could forget when history was made when the lacrosse girls won their first ever match at the games, but just missed out on a bronze.
“It was a hard task prying the kids back from their host families as in most cases they have opened their homes to them and went the extra mile with their hospitality.”
Yaron, a pupil at Hendon school, is already UK national champion at 200m breaststroke, a title he won just prior to leaving for the States. He has been swimming since the age of seven and joined Barnet Copthall at the age of 11, when he quickly rose through the ranks to become one of their star swimmers.
In Orange County he took gold in the 50m, 100m and 200m backstroke, the same again in the breaststroke – his favourite stroke – and the 200m and 400m individual medley. His silvers came in the team relay events.
He said: “I really enjoyed the competition and was over the moon to win so many medals. My dream now is to represent GB at the Olympics in Rio.”
In football the U14 boys won gold in what ended up being a cantor against OC and ran out comfortable winners 8-1, but the story was in the morning game against Westchester.
With 15 minutes remaining, the seemingly unbeatable GB team were 4 - 2 down and were not comfortable to say the least. But they stormed back to clinch a 5-4 victory with Josh Shack scoring in the last minute to take them to the final.