By A.Fedeski (FSWC Educator)

Shaul Ladany was born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, on April 2, 1936. Three years later, the outbreak of World War II changed everything for his middle-class Jewish family: his grandparents were deported and murdered at Auschwitz, while he and his parents were forced to flee to Hungary. In 1944, they were among 1,700 Jews ransomed from Hungary by the Nazis on the infamous Kastner train, eventually reaching safety in Switzerland after a harrowing stay at Bergen-Belsen.

After briefly returning to Belgrade, the family moved to Israel in 1948. There, Ladany continued his education and went to the US to earn a PhD in Business Administration from Columbia University. He eventually pursued an academic career as professor of Industrial Engineering and Management at Ben Gurion University, authoring over 100 academic papers and a dozen books.

Once an amateur marathon runner, in his mid-20s Ladany discovered race walking. He represented Israel in the 1968 and 1972 Olympics, setting a world record in the 50-mile walk in 1972 that still stands to this day. As a Holocaust survivor, it was a meaningful moment for Ladany to return to Germany for the 1972 Olympics where he even wore a Star of David on his warmup jersey. Things dramatically changed with the horrifying attack on the Israeli Olympic team by the Black September terrorist group, which led to the killing of 11 athletes.

Awaking to discover the apartments on either side of his own had been attacked by the terrorists, Ladany fled through a back door and alerted American athletes, who contacted the German police. He was one of only five Israeli athletes to survive the attack. Ladany’s survival, and the loss of his fellow athletes, affected him deeply. In 1992, speaking of the massacre two decades later, Ladany said: "It's with me all the time, and I remember every detail".

He returned to racing just months after the massacre and continued competing into his seventies, famously walking his age in kilometers on each birthday. He estimates he has more than 500,000 miles in his lifetime. A member of the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, Ladany's legacy bridges survival, sport and scholarship. When asked what he'd like on his tombstone, he replied, “He walked and he walked until he walked away.”

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