Although born in Cairo, Jamil El-Reedy spent most of his young life in Plattsburgh, New York, where his parents moved to in the aftermath of the Six-Day War between Israel and Egypt in 1967. With his father as his coach, he learned to ski on Whiteface Mountain and gained local notoriety as a star skier at his high school. Having never received professional training or competed at an international event, he qualified for the 1984 Winter Olympics through his Egyptian heritage and became the first (and, as of 2018, only) Winter Olympic competitor for that nation. His father focused on mental training and gave his son regular, arduous tasks, including sending him to a cave filled with snakes and scorpions in the desert for 40 days. El-Reedy took part in three alpine skiing events at the 1984 Games, placing 46th out of 101 entrants in the slalom, 60th out of 61 participants in the downhill, and failing to finish in the giant slalom after falling in the first run. He later earned a doctorate in physics and became a professor at Northern Virginia Community College.
Egypt