DERSHWITZ Eli

General
FUTURE PLANS
He has considered combining coaching with his sporting career after he has competed at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo. He has already served as a volunteer assistant fencing coach at Harvard University in Cambridge, MA, United States of America. "I would definitely be interested in at least part-time coaching or training with the Harvard team while I continue to compete. And then also getting involved in some type of athletics or sports non profit work and looking forward to figuring out and brainstorming ways in getting involved in that after the Olympics in Tokyo as I look toward the next part of my life. I feel like my expertise is within athletic training and the way that training can help other aspects of a college athlete or a younger athlete's life. That's definitely something I'd be interested in finding out how to spread that knowledge or that experience to other people that it could make a big difference in their lives." (usafencing.org, 16 Feb 2021; gocrimson.com, 01 Sep 2019)

RIO EXPERIENCE
He took a year out from university to concentrate on training full-time ahead of the 2016 Olympic Games. However, he suffered defeat in the round of 32 in Rio de Janeiro. "The whole year really taught me the importance of work ethics day in and day out. I really thought it was going to be smooth sailing, training full-time would be easier, but no one told me that there would be good days and bad days, good weeks and bad weeks. The people who are going to jump to the next level have the ability to work through the bad weeks." (Trans World Sport YouTube channel, 24 Oct 2018)

In the 2017/18 season he became the first US male sabre fencer to win the overall World Cup title. (usafencing.org, 16 Feb 2021)

He became the first male fencer representing the United States of America to win gold in individual sabre at the world junior championships by securing victory at the 2015 edition of the tournament in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. (SportsDeskOnline, 17 Jun 2019; usfencing.org, 08 Apr 2015)