Where the Olympic journey of young athletes begins: EYOF 2025

Where the Olympic journey of young athletes begins.

That’s EYOF 2025 Skopje – the European Youth Olympic Festival. A multisport youth event that welcomed over 4,000 athletes from more than 50 countries across the Europe.

I’m grateful  that I had the opportunity to support the Czech Olympic Team and help ensure everything ran smoothly, so our young athletes could feel comfortable and perform at their best. I’ve experienced many events like this before but always as an athlete. This time I returned to the world of high-performance sport from the other side – as a Czech Republic NOC Assistant. Our team consisted of 96 athletes and we proudly brought home 14 medals.

For the first time ever taekwondo was included in the EYOF programme. My sport. The sport I dedicated myself to from childhood through to competing for Czech national team. This time I wasn’t the one fighting. I had the privilege of standing beside a new generation of athletes motivating them, sharing experience and supporting them on their journey.

I’m especially proud of the young athletes I’ve had the chance to coach, who qualified to represent Czechia at EYOF. They all fought well. Unfortunately we didn’t win any taekwondo medals this time but I believe they’re going home with something even more valuable: unforgettable experiences, new friendships, and a lot of team pins proudly displayed on their accreditations after trading with the others.

I admire every single athlete who pushed through the brutal heat. The temperatures in Skopje was over 42°C during the week. Organising an event like this could be really hard. There were some initial challenges with logistics, food and communication, but that only makes me appreciate even more how focused and resilient our athletes were. They didn’t let anything stop them and they all took one big step closer to their dreams – Olympic dreams.