Part 2: Olympic athletes from deaf community
Yesterday I shared news about three Olympic athletes from the deaf community, two deaf and one Coda. I got word that there are two more Coda athletes.
The first is 24-year-old Sabrina Lozada-Cabbage, who plays as a center on the Puerto Rico women’s basketball team. Her jersey number is 28. A profile on Olympics.com says she was born in Idaho and currently resides in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
A feature from the Santa Fe New Mexican explains that Sabrina’s parents’ names are Roddy and Emma, who are both deaf and work at the New Mexico School for the Deaf. Sabrina is eligible to play on the Puerto Rico team because her grandmother lives there.
The article explains that Sabrina’s father played on the U.S. handball team for the 1989 Deaflympics, where he won a bronze medal. Sabrina was a star athlete for Santa Fe High School, winning a state championship in 2014. She played college basketball at Wichita State University and professionally in Europe.
It is Puerto Rico’s first time ever sending a women’s basketball team, so Sabrina is a part of Puerto Rican history. The team currently has a 0-2 record in the group stage and will play against Australia on Monday.
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The second Coda athlete is Melvin Twellaar, a 24-year-old member of Netherlands’ men’s Double Sculls team. He won the silver medal on Wednesday.
His profile on Olympics.com explains that he studies pedagogy (teaching methods) at Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences. He hopes to work with children in the future and said his interest in educating youth comes from his upbringing as a child of deaf parents.
So, that’s the two additional Coda athletes. That means as far as I know, there are two deaf athletes and three Coda athletes in Tokyo 2020.