Billie Jean helps Women’s Benevolent

JACK MILNER

One of the greatest tennis players of all time, Billie Jean King, has donated memorabilia to the Johannesburg Jewish Women’s Benevolent Society to help them raise funds.

Marlene Bethlehem, herself a tennis player of note who has participated on the international platform, used her contacts to ask Billie Jean for a signed racquet that they could raffle. 

“Billie-Jean is well known for her generosity and not only did she send us a racquet, but also a signed edition of her book as well as a poster,” said Marlene. “Billie Jean was also involved in a concert to raise funds for an Aids concert with Elton John.

Both have signed the poster along with eight tennis players, including Grand Slam winners Andy Roddick, Steffi Graf, Martina Naratilova and Andre Agassi.

“We held a raffle and the winner was Rael Berelowitz,” said Marlene.

As the winner lives in London, the memorabilia were handed over to JJ van der Linde at Global Capital, the firm with which Berelowitz is associated.

Marlene, president of the organisation, and her vice-president, Annette Angel, have donated many years of their time to the Women’s Benevolent. In fact, between the two of them they have been active for 99 years. The organisation is 121 years old, having served the Jewish people of Johannesburg continuously.

Those who know Billie Jean cannot help but be affected by her determination and charm. She is outspoken and does not mince her words. In 2002 she was in South Africa for the Nike Junior Tour International Masters which on that occasion joined forces with World TeamTennis, the organisation owned by Billie Jean and Ilana Kloss, at Sun City.

Speaking to the youngsters aged between 11 and 14, Billie Jean was amazed by how many of the players did not know the names of some of the tennis greats from their respective countries. “If you don’t know where you come from, how do you know where you are going,” she asked them.

Perhaps my favourite quote from her best puts Billie Jean King into perspective. “A champion is afraid of losing. Everyone else is afraid of winning.”

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Top Israeli athlete heads for SA

Israeli athlete Kobi Oren will be in South Africa this month to compete in a 10-day circuit race.

Oren, who is a clinical psychologist, has been running for some 25 years. He began competing in 2 000 metre races in junior high school and later graduated to longer runs.

Once out of the army he resumed running, starting with 10 km races and working his way up to full marathons. In the past five years he has been running cross country races after suffering an injury.

In 2008 he started competing in ultramarathons and ran his first 80 km race. Later that year he participated in the Mountain-to-Valley relay race, in the longest category at the time, which consisted of two relay runners covering a distance of 200 km. He and his partner came in second.

“After my experience in the Mountain-to-Valley relay race, a friend and I approached the organising team and as a result, a 129 km ultramarathon category was opened in this race as well. One year later I placed first in this category,” said Oren.

In recent years he has participated in over 10 different ultramarathons, ranging from 100 km to the Mountain-to-Valley’s 212 km.

“In 2011 I participated in Israel’s first 24 hour, 168 km cyclic cross country endurance race and later ran 186 km in the Sovev-Emek ultramarathon. In 2012 I ran a distance of 267 km in the Sovev-Emek ultramarathon – an Israeli record in continuous ultramarathon running.”

In terms of international events, 2013 was a breakthrough year for him. In March he participated in the endurance race championship in Athens in which runners ran repeatedly around a 1km track. The winner is the runner who completes the most cycles in a given amount of time. “I ran 360 km in three days,” he said.

This year he participated in the six-day category of the Athens Ultramarathon Festival. He won, running continuously for six days. “I came in first, running 768 km, the third best result in the world in this race.”

The South African event takes place in Pretoria from December 13.