Team Facts & News

From 1986 to 2013, the United States Teams have brought home: 49 Gold Medals, 35 Silver Medals, 29 Bronze Medals, and 11 Honorable Mentions. — AAPT.ORG

2014 Physics Olympics Team Banner

Meet the Team

  • Alexander Bourzutschky

    Traveling Team

    Silver Spring, MD

    Montgomery Blair High School

    Teacher: James Schafer

    Senior

    Bio:

    From an early age, I excelled at mathematics. I was learning algebra and long division earlier than most of my peers. I especially enjoyed word problems… read more

  • Eric Chen

    San Diego, CA

    Canyon Crest Academy

    Teacher: John Danssaert

    Senior

    Bio:

    This past year has been a dizzying roller coaster ride in which friction can be neglected. I've been fortunate to have all of the amazing opportunities … read more

  • Kevin Fei

    Traveling Team

    Carmel, IN

    Carmel High School

    Teacher: Kimi Fellers

    Junior

    Bio:

    As a youngster curious about the world, I had fair success studying most topics I encountered. I possessed a general inclination towards math and scienc… read more

  • Calvin Huang

    Traveling Team

    Palo Alto, CA

    Henry M. Gunn High School

    Teacher: Bill Dunbar

    Senior

    Bio:

    In elementary school, I discovered the joy of making stuff. Around second or third grade, my dad took me to Fry's Electronics. We passed by the kits ais… read more

  • Youbin Kim

    New York, NY

    Stuyvesant High School

    Teacher: Jamal Ali

    Senior

    Bio:

    If I only had one word to represent myself, I would choose "curiosity". I wouldn't be surprised if half of the words I spoke in my childhood were why's … read more

  • Rohan Kodialam

    Lincroft, NJ

    High Technology High School

    Teacher: Jennifer Martino

    Junior

    Bio:

    My earliest childhood memories are of cozy evenings spent curled up in the family room learning math and science from my Dad, an applied mathematician. … read more

  • Celine Liang

    Saratoga, CA

    Saratoga High School

    Teacher: Kirk Davis

    Sophomore

    Bio:

    I was first introduced to the beauty of problem solving in the 7th grade when I decided to try my hand at the MathCounts competition series. I realized … read more

  • Grace Lin

    Palo Alto, CA

    Palo Alto High School

    Teacher: Ron Bowditch

    Senior

    Bio:

    I'm excited to be invited back to camp for another year! I had a great time designing experiments in lab and learning more physics last year. I can't wa… read more

  • Kelvin Lu

    Fremont, CA

    Mission San Jose High School

    Teacher: Peter Geschke

    Junior

    Bio:

    I didn't know exactly what physics was in elementary school except for a cool science term that people used in newspapers and TV shows. My first experie… read more

  • Christina Pan

    Cupertino, CA

    Monta Vista High School

    Teacher: James Birdsong

    Junior

    Bio:

    Unlike most people here, as a kid, I was more naturally talented in the humanities, especially in terms of reading skills and learning languages. At tha… read more

  • Jared Schaumann

    Sugar Land, TX

    John Foster Dulles High School

    Teacher: Judy Matney

    Senior

    Bio:

    When I was in kindergarten, one of my first interests in math came when I overheard my mom explaining negative numbers to my older sister. My sister did… read more

  • Rahul Sridhar

    San Jose, CA

    The Harker School

    Teacher: Eric Nelson

    Senior

    Bio:

    Like nearly all the other finalists, my interest in physics began with my love of mathematics. It's tempting to say that I was attracted to math because… read more

  • Vikram Sundar

    Traveling Team

    San Jose, CA

    The Harker School

    Teacher: Eric Nelson

    Senior

    Bio:

    I have always been interested in math. From a very young age I was enthralled by the pattern recognition problems which my parents gave me. Math fascina… read more

  • Alexandr Wang

    Los Alamos, NM

    Los Alamos High School

    Teacher: Julie Wangler

    Junior

    Bio:

    I've always been inspired by discovery. I live in Los Alamos, New Mexico, where during World War II, some of the greatest scientific minds in the world … read more

  • Michael Winer

    Traveling Team

    Silver Spring, MD

    Montgomery Blair High School

    Teacher: James Schafer

    Junior

    Bio:

    Who am I? I'm a person who likes his textbooks long, his equations short, his bagels well-done, and his meat medium-rare. I am one of the happiest peopl… read more

  • Andrew Zhang

    San Jose, CA

    The Harker School

    Teacher: Eric Nelson

    Junior

    Bio:

    My grandmother, once a math teacher, instilled in me an interest in math. To challenge myself, I began participating in contests such as MATHCOUNTS and … read more

  • Liang Zhou

    Riverside, CA

    John W North High School

    Teacher: Michele Lieux

    Senior

    Bio:

    Here's a welcome surprise - my first task as part of the 2014 Physics Team is not to do physics but to write in coherent English, something that as a se… read more

  • Kevin Zhu

    San Jose, CA

    The Harker School

    Teacher: Eric Nelson

    Senior

    Bio:

    I've always been passionate about astronomy. As a kid, I peppered visits to the planetarium with questions about the moons of Jupiter and the Voyager sp… read more

  • Licheng Zhu

    Lincolnshire, IL

    Adlai Stevenson High School

    Teacher: Sheila Edstrom

    Senior

    Bio:

    Back when I was a freshman, I wanted to be a lawyer. Pursuing STEM was far from my mind. I was only merely "decent" at math.

    But I soon found I h… read more