96 Friday, August 16, 1985

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

SILVER LINING

Natalie Greenspan, 17, of Birmingham
won a silver medal at the Maccabiah
Games. But most of all she loved the
experience of Israel and making
new friendships.

BY ALAN HITSKY
News Editor

Four thousand Jewish athletes
from around the world marched into
Ramat Gan Stadium in Israel last
month for the start of the "Jewish
Olympics," the 12th Maccabiah
Games:- It was an'emotional scene
that will never be forgotten by
Natalie Greenspan of Birmingham,
one of 13 Michigan athletes who
participated in the Games.
"Walking in with the American
team, the roar . of the crowd as we
came out from under the stands onto
the field ... it was just an incredible
experience, something I can't explain
to people," the 17-year-old high
school senior told The Jewish News.
"Being in Israel, 50,000 people
in the stands welcoming you, (Olym-
pic hero and former Maccabiah
champion) Mark Spitz carrying the
torch, the daughters of the slain
Munich athletes at the ceremonies
— it was all very touching, very
moving."
Natalie's trip to Israel for the
Maccabiah Games began last year.
Area coaches told her about the
Junior Maccabiah Games that - were
hosted by the Jewish Community
Center in West Bloomfield last fall.
An All-State sprinter on the Detroit
Country Day School Class C state
champion girl's track team, Natalie
did well in the Junior Maccabiah
and her coaches continued to submit
her times during the year to the
U.S. Committee Sports for Israel in
Philadelphia for consideration for
the U.S. Maccabiah team. Unlike
other sports where tryouts determine
team. selection, the U.S. Committee
selected the track and swimming
teams on the basis of verified times.
Natalie has been running since
grade school, when she found that
she could easily beat most of the
boys in races at Birmingham's Bin-
gham Farms Elementary. She cony
tinued running track in seventh and
eighth grades at Berkshire Middle
School, and then got serious about
the sport when she transferred to
Detroit Country Day for high school.

.

Natalie Greenspan displays her athletic ability on the track.

"We start in November with
weight training and long-distance
running up the hills and through the
woods near the school," explains
Natalie. Actually, her workouts
begin and end each day by climbing
the fence which separates her house
from the school's 13 Mile-Lahser
campus.
The Country Day team also
travels frequently in the winter to
'open meets in Macomb County, Ann
Arbor. and East .Lansing. Natalie
feels the tough competition at the
open meets helps prepare the team
for its Class C schedule and invita-
tional meets at Michigan colleges in

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the spring. Country Day won the
Class C championship in 1984 and
1985, and Natalie participated on
title-winning 400-meter, 800-meter
and mile relay teams.
Her relay experience paid off in
Israel, as she ran the third leg on
the silver medal-winning 400-meter
and 1600-meter teams. She also be-
came very close to her relay team-
mates and other athletes at the
Games.
Athletes from the same sports
were housed at the same hoteli, and
Natalie shared quarters with her
relay teammates from Yale Univer-
sity, the University of Massachu-
setts, and Philadelphia high school
student Hannah Kramer. The two
high school sprinters got along so
well that Hannah is coming to visit
Natalie in the fall.
"I made a lot of good friends,"
Natalie says, "especially my room-
mates. I spent so much time with

them that we became very close
friends. We also met people from all

over the world." The athletes par-
ticipated in the age-old custom of
trading their national uniforms and
tokens. "Rookies like me didn't,, do
very well" in the trading, Nataiie
laughs ruefully, but she still brought
home T-shirts from Israel, Holland
and Mexico and several pins.
Natalie says the athletes "were
a lot freer" during the Games "than
I thought we'd be. People tended to
stick with athletes from their own
countries to some degree, but there
was a lot of socializing. You *slim
friends with the people you 'were
going to compete against."
Although her parents, Dr.
Robert and Elaine Galin, and her
brother Steven Greenspan, traveled
to Israel with her, Natalie spent
most of her time during the Games

with the athletes and then joined
her family after the Games ended for
four days in Jerusalem. The athletes
toured Masada, the Dead Sea, Yad

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