Israel's Paralympic rowers and kayakers put together a rewarding 24 hours at two separate world championships this week, with two crews advancing to the next round and a third athlete finally getting his hands on a medal he had actually won a month earlier.
At the Paracanoe World Championships on the Malta Regatta Course in Poznań, Poland, Talia Eilat reached Wednesday's semifinal after clocking 1:01.09 over 200 metres to finish sixth in her heat. Mushka Cohen, racing in a different sport class, also advanced, timing 1:05.09 for seventh place.
Roman Ternik's championships ended at the heats stage. He crossed the line in 57.03 seconds, good for eighth place and no further progress. Three more Israelis, Adi Ezra, Ron Halevi and Uriah Nordan, are entered in Thursday's preliminary races.
In Amsterdam, the PR2 mixed double sculls pair of Saleh Shahin and Shahar Milfelder booked their place in the World Rowing Championships final. The Paris 2024 Paralympic bronze medallists finished second in their heat over 2,000 metres in 9:26.40 on Tuesday at the Bosbaan course, comfortably inside the automatic qualifying places.
Milfelder, from Beit Yitzchak, and Shahin, a Druze rower from Shfaram, have been one of Israeli para-rowing's most consistent partnerships since teaming up before Paris, where they took bronze in the mixed double sculls. A strong result in Amsterdam would keep them among the world's best heading toward the Los Angeles 2028 cycle.
The more unusual story of the day belonged to Shmuel Daniel, known to teammates as Shmulik, the men's PR1 single sculls rower. He collected his bronze medal on Wednesday morning, roughly five weeks after actually winning it.
Daniel finished fourth at the European Championships in Varese, Italy, in early August, and the podium ceremony there had long finished by the time officials acted on a protest filed by the Israeli delegation. It centred on Ukraine's Roman Polianskyi, who had rowed to bronze but, the protest alleged, had not properly fastened the seat-strapping required of PR1 competitors. Hours later, World Rowing's jury upheld the objection and disqualified Polianskyi, retroactively promoting Daniel to third.
By the time the ruling came through, the ceremony in Varese was over and no medal had been handed out to Daniel. He had to wait until organisers in Amsterdam this week were able to present it to him in person.
Together, the results add up to a strong week for Israel's Paralympic squad on the water: two crews still alive for finals medals in Poznań and Amsterdam, and a bronze finally banked for Daniel, all part of a broader build-up as Israeli para-kayakers and para-rowers push for places on the Los Angeles 2028 team.
