Nationality Israel Height 1.89 m Club Maccabi Tel Aviv Name Dmitry Kroyter Residence Tel Aviv, Israel | Coached by Anatoly Shafran Events High jump Sport Track and field Weight 71 kg | |
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Born 18 February 1993 (age 31) ( 1993-02-18 ) Siberia, Russia | ||
Dmitry (Dima) Kroyter (Hebrew: דמיטרי קרויטר, [ˈkʀɔɪ̯tɐ], Russian: Дмитрий Кройтер; born 18 February 1993) is an Israeli Olympic high jumper. He is a former World Youth Champion and Youth Olympics Champion.
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Early life
Born in Siberia, Kroyter and his family emigrated to Israel in 1999. He grew up in south Tel Aviv, raised by his single mother, Tatiana, who works as a housekeeper. His parents are divorced, and he has no contact with his father Piotr, who lives in Moldova. His brother Evgeni died from a serious liver illness in 2012. Kroyter served in the Israel Defense Forces, completing his service in 2015.
High jumping career
Kroyter has been coached in the high jump since 2005 by Anatoly "Tolek" Shafran, at Maccabi Tel Aviv.
In 2009 he became Israel's first Youth (17 or younger) World Champion at the age of 16 by winning the gold medal with a high jump of 2.20 m at the 2009 World Youth Championships in Athletics (the sixth IAAF World Youth Championships in Athletics) in Brixen, Italy. That year Kroyter also won the Israeli senior championship in the high jump, with a jump of 2.19 m. In June 2009 he set a world record for boys under 17 years of age, at 2.21 m. He was hampered, however, by a thigh injury that prevented him from training.
In 2010, despite a nagging injury Kroyter won the gold medal in the high jump at the Youth (18 or younger) Olympics in Singapore. His jump of 2.24 at the age of 16 at a competition in Moscow in February 2010 remains as of August 2016 the best high jump ever by a European youth under 17 years of age. He was dubbed a "rising young star" at the age of 17 by Allon Sinai of the Jerusalem Post.
In 2011, he cleared 2.28 m while he was 17 years of age (a personal best at the time). Later in the year, at the IAAF World Championships in Athletics in Daegu, South Korea, Kroyter cleared 2.16 m in the Men's High Jump qualifiers. He was the youngest competitor in the event, at 18 years of age.
In 2012 Kroyter came 4th in the Men's high jump at the 2012 World Junior Championships in Athletics in Barcelona, Spain. He also won a gold medal at the 76th Israeli Athletics Championships.
In 2014 he was about to retire because of pain from a relentless injury, but came back from it.
Kroyter won a silver medal in Men's High Jump with a jump of 2.24 m at the European Athletics Under-23 Championships in Tallinn, Estonia, in July 2015.
His career-best high jump as of July 2016 was 2.29 m, in Schifflange, Luxembourg, in August 2015. That met the International Association of Athletics Federations Olympic qualifying standard.
Kroyter represented Israel at the 2016 Olympics, at the age of 23. He exited in the qualification round after having jumped 2.17 m.