Lee Korzits

Lee Korzits was born on March 25, 1984, in the coastal area of Israel — sources variously identify her birthplace as Kibbutz Michmoret and the nearby community of Hofit, both on Israel's Mediterranean coast.[1][2] From an early age she was drawn to the sea, and she later recalled having been in the water for as long as she could remember.[1]

As a child she pursued multiple sports simultaneously, taking up windsurfing, judo, and athletics at around age eight.[2] By the time she was 14, she had become Israel's leading female judoka in her age group and won a national judo gold medal.[2] Despite this success on the mat, she ultimately chose to concentrate on windsurfing, beginning to focus on the Mistral class at age 13.[1]

Korzits entered her first World Championships in Austria in 2002, finishing 23rd.[1] Later that year she placed seventh at the European Championships, a result that hinted at the rapid rise to come.[1] The following year, at age 19, she won the windsurfing World Championship in Cádiz, Spain, becoming the youngest person ever to claim that title.[2] After the victory, she learned that her brother's military unit was entering Jenin. She recalled that their mother had “two kids in battle that day,” contrasting her sporting win with the hope that her brother would return safely.[1]

At the 2004 Athens Olympics — her first Games — Korzits finished 13th.[1][2] She also placed fourth at the 2004 World Championships.[1] After Athens, a series of injuries disrupted her career, ultimately costing her a place on Israel's team at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.[1] During this difficult stretch she announced her retirement in protest against what she described as the “petty politics of the Israeli sporting world,” though she did not ultimately leave the sport permanently.[2]

On April 1, 2009, while surfing in Hawaii, Korzits suffered a near-fatal accident when another surfer's board struck her in the back, breaking two ribs and a leg and narrowly missing her spine.[2] She later described the sensation in the waves as being “like a rag in a washing machine” and wrote that she had been “given my life as a present.”[2] She returned to international competition fifteen months after the accident.[2]

Her comeback met with further danger almost immediately. At the 2010 European Championships in Poland, Korzits was knocked off her board by another competitor, became trapped underwater, and was rescued unconscious after what was described as a terrifying couple of minutes.[2]

Despite these ordeals, she returned to the top of the sport with remarkable consistency. In 2011 she won a silver medal at the European Championship.[1] In December of that year she captured her second world title in Perth, Australia.[3] A few months later, in March 2012, she won the women's RS:X title at the ISAF Sailing World Cup in Cádiz — her third world championship — winning four races and leading throughout the competition.[3] The victory secured her place at the London Olympics and came with a NIS 100,000 grant, half of which was allocated to her coach, Ben Finkelstein.[3]

At the London 2012 Games, Korzits entered the final medal race in second place overall, but finished ninth in that race and ended the competition sixth without a medal.[4] She responded with characteristic composure: “I did my best. The others did better.”[4] She also said she was proud to represent Israel and that there were more important things in life than a lost medal, “like friendship.”[4]

In 2013, at the World Championships in Brazil, Korzits won her fourth world title — her third consecutive gold at the premier windsurfing world championship outside the Olympic Games.[1][5] That event also marked the first time two Israeli representatives stood on the same podium, with Maayan Davidovich taking third place.[5]

In 2017, Korzits was inducted into the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame.[6] Her four world titles came in 2003, 2011, 2012, and 2013.[1] The 2013 championship also marked the first time two Israeli representatives stood on the same podium at the event, with Maayan Davidovich taking third place alongside Korzits's gold.[5]

By 2023, Korzits had been battling cancer for years.[7] During treatment at Rabin Medical Center, she disclosed that she had undergone chemotherapy and biological therapy in preparation for a bone-marrow transplant, and that an examination after seven rounds of chemotherapy showed no signs of disease.[7]

The Jewish Virtual Library states that Korzits's 2011 championship made her the first Israeli, male or female, to win two world titles in an individual sport.[1] The claim was not independently corroborated in the other approved sources and is therefore presented with attribution rather than as an established historical record.