The sport has taken the computer worker to competitions all over Europe, as well as in Israel. On Saturday, [Feldman] placed second in the Israeli championship race, a 21-km mission, as part of the 22nd Dead Sea Half- Marathon event in Ein Gedi.

Ziv Bar Shira, who retained his crown as Israeli national champion in Ein Gedi, compared the handcycle to a bicycle rather than a wheelchair.

"Athens is just the next step for this growing sport," said [Hans Mayrhofer], who won the overall Ein Gedi competition by about six minutes, and topped 22 of 23 races worldwide last year. "I came in third in Holland. A race is a race and you can't win them all. But I do want to see more people from the US where handcycling is trying to gain popularity."