Peter Paltchik

Peter Paltchik (פיטר פלצ'יק, ; born 4 January 1992) is a Ukrainian-born Israeli judoka, competing in the under 100 kg weight category, of which he is the current number 1 ranked Judoka in the world.

Paltchik was born in 1992 in Yalta, Crimea (Ukraine).

As a 9 month old baby, he immigrated to Israel with his mother Larisa and resided in the city of Rishon LeZion, Israel.

About a year later, his maternal grandparents immigrated to Israel as well.

By the time he was seven years old, Paltchik's mother had lived in the United States for work purposes, and Paltchik grew up in Israel with his grandparents.

He attended the Yigal Alon High School, majoring in communication.

He served as a logistic soldier at the Tzrifin base of the Israeli Air Force.

He was born at a weight of 5.1 kg with crooked bones and various health problems, and the doctor recommended his family let Paltchik practice sports.

His grandfather sent him to practice judo when he was four years old at the "Samurai Club" in Rishon LeZion under the guidance of Pavel Musin.

At the age of 16, he joined the Israeli Judo Cadet Team.

At the age of 17, he won the Israel cadet championship, Junior championship, and the U23 championship that season.

At the age of 18 he joined the national senior judo team under the Israel national coach Oren Samadja.

In September 2011, Paltchik competed in the European Championship U20 in Lumel, Belgium, and  won a silver medal in the -90 kg weight category.

In June 2012, Paltchik underwent a complicated surgery in the right knee following a rupture of the posterior cruciate ligament during routine training.

Because of the surgery and the rehabilitation, the shift to the senior level was interrupted until 2014.

In January 2014, Peter returned to practice as part of the senior Israeli judo team.

In February 2014 he won a bronze medal in the European Open in Oberwart.

In September, he again won a bronze medal at the European Open in Tallinn.

He competed in the U100 kg category in the Israeli championship that year, and won the gold medal.

In 2015, Paltchik decided, together with the national team coach, to raise the weight category U100 kg in order to improve his performance on the mat.

In June 2015, he participated in the European Games held in Baku, and was eliminated in the second round.

In November 2015, in the midst of the race to the Olympic games in Rio de Janeiro, Peter took part in the Qingdao Grand Prix in China, and ripped the ligaments in his shoulder during a fight against the Mongolian Olympic champion, Naidan.

He had to undergo a long rehabilitation of 9 months.

Paltchik married his Israeli girlfriend Daniel Youlzary in April 2016.

In February 2017, he won a bronze medal at the European Cup competition in Rome.

In March, he participated in the Baku Grand Slam and reached fifth place.

At the 2017 European Championship held in Warsaw in April, Paltchik reached seventh place.

On June, a competition was held at the European Tour in Bucharest, Romania, where Paltchik won a bronze medal.

Later that month, he won a gold medal in the Cancún Grand Prix, after winning in the semifinals the Brazilian former world champion, Luciano Correra, and beating Irish Benjamin Fletcher in the waza-ari.

In the 2017 World Championships held in September in Budapest, Paltchik lost in the round-of-16 to Michael Korrel from Netherlands,World Championships who was ranked first in the world.

In October, Paltchik won a bronze medal at the Abu Dhabi Grand Slam, after defeating Miklós Cirjenics from Hungary.

In April 2018, Paltchik won the gold medal in the Tbilisi Grand Prix in Georgia, when he defeated Merab Margiev of Russia in the final, after two minutes and a half.

In the 2018 European Championship held in April in Tel Aviv, Paltchik won a bronze medal in the category U100 kg.

In the first round, he met Latvia's Jevgenijs Borodavko.

Two minutes from the start of the fight, Peter won a wazari, that eventually make him pass the first round.

In the top-16, he met the Serbian Bojan Dosen, and after four minutes without scoring, the battle went into a golden score, in which the Serbian took the third penalty and Paltchik went up to the quarterfinal.

At that stage, Paltchik overcame Zelym Kotsoiev from Azerbaijan, when a minute and 13 seconds to the end of the fight, he managed to get a wazari.

In September 2019 he won the Israeli championship in the 100+ Kg category.

Paltchik won the gold medal at the 2020 European Judo Championships in Prague on November 21, 2020, beating Russian judoka Arman Adamian in the final, Adding to his bronze medal from the 2018 European Judo Championships in Tel Aviv.

Paltchik also won a bronze medal in the mixed team judo competition in the 2021 Olympics.