Josh Binstock. Photo: www.killontwo.com.

Canada defeated England in a first round volleyball match at the 2012 London Olympics thanks, in part, to one of Canada’s elite volleyball players: Josh Binstock.

The six-foot-five Jewish athlete, 31, is competing in his first Olympic Games, according to the Jewish Chronicle. Next up, Binstock and the rest of the Canadian team will be playing in matches against Norway, Italy and Brazil.

Binstock is also a doctor, another reason to make his mother proud and is taking off from his practice  as a chiropractor to pursue the Olympic dream. Upon his arrival in London, he blogged: “[This] was what I had been dreaming about since I started playing this sport and what I put my chiropractic career on hold to pursue.”

Though he began his career in sports as a hockey player, the sportsman took up volleyball at age sixteen, eventually coaching a volleyball team at a Jewish Community Center in his native Ontario. In 2009, Binstock competed in the Maccabiah Games in Israel and will continue to represent Maccabi Canada at the world’s 19^th Maccabiah Games next year.

Binstock is not the only Jewish beach volleyball player at the London 2012 Games, others include Sean Rosenthal of the US team, and South African Grant Goldschmidt.