The sport of shooting is not as action-packed as you’d think. Shooters must make steady, precise motions and control their breathing to hit their targets. In the women’s only sport pistol event, these targets are placed 25 meters away.
It’s also not terribly Jewish. So far, it seems that the most decorated Jewish sports marksmen was Morris Fisher, a five-time gold medallist who competed at the 1920 and 1924 Olympics. There’s also Lev Vainshtein, a Soviet world champion shooter and Olympic bronze medallist from the 1950s and Israeli Guy Starik, who competed at the 1996, 2000, 2004 and 2008 Olympics.
But at the 2024 Paris Olympics, 100 years after Morris Fisher, there will be up-and-coming American Jewish shooter Ada Korkhin. She will compete in the sport pistol event.
Here are 18 things to know about the American sport pistol shooter.
1. Ada Korkhin was born on Nov. 24, 2004 in Brookline, Massachusetts.
2. She’s a Sagittarius!
3. In Hebrew, Ada means “jewel” or “ornament.” It also has roots in the Torah. Ada was the name of a wife of Lemach and Esau.
4. Her Israeli father Yakov introduced her to air pistol shooting when she was just 9 years old.
“My dad brought me here because there is a Junior Program, so I went one day and I thought it was a lot of fun, so I kept coming here,” she told NBC Boston. “I was doing a ton of other sports. I did soccer, I did gymnastics, I did a little bit of ballet, and a little bit of piano, so this was very different than what I have done before and obviously it’s a very unique sport.”
5. She learned how to shoot at the Massachusetts Rifle Association, American’s oldest active gun club.
6. Ada competed in her first national competition when she was just 10 years old!
7. Ada had her bat mitzvah at Temple Sinai in Brookline in 2016.
8. Pistol shooting has taught Ada about responsibility and discipline. You can listen to her talk about it in an interview below:
9. She graduated from Brookline High School in 2023. She’s currently studying biochemistry at Ohio State University, where she also earned an athletic scholarship.
10. Ada likes the mental aspect of the sport.
“I’m not a very athletic person. So I like that I can still compete in a sport,” Ada said in an interview.
11. According to USA Shooting, Ada chooses what genre of music to listen to based on what shooting event she is currently preparing for!
12. Ada participated in the Olympic trials for the 2020/2021 Tokyo Olympic Games, but just missed the cut.
13. She’s only ever had one gun! According to Ada, it “hasn’t failed” her.
14. Some of her career highlights include a gold medal at the 2024 Championship of the Americas (CAT) Games in Women’s 25m Sport Pistol Team, and a bronze medal from the 2023 International Shooting Sports Federation (ISSF) Junior World Championship in Women’s 25m Sport Pistol.
Plus…
15. Ada is the 2024 United States national champion in women’s air pistol!
16. At the 2024 Olympic trials, Ada didn’t realize she had qualified until after the competition.
“My parents and my coach told me after I finished the final that I was going and I didn’t believe them at first, but after that I was just so happy. I was in shock, I think I still am,” she said.
17. Ada didn’t see herself going to the Olympics!
“I’ve been training for so long, but I didn’t see myself getting here,” Ada told Brookline News. “I’m super excited, obviously, and a little nervous… it feels really surreal.”
18. After competing at the Olympics, she’ll return to Ohio for her sophomore year of college.
