Photo Caption: Pavel Budský hit his 166th home run last weekend, but, even at age 47, he can still leg out a single. In fact, last weekend he also became the first player in Czech history to reach the 1,000-hit milestone. Photo Credit: Lenka Brožová.
Brno, June 23 (BD) — The Czech Baseball Podcast has posted English-language episodes prior to the international break and Juraj Plekanec won the Sunrise Marathon in 02:44:55 on Sunday.
BASEBALL
Draci Win First Two, but Hroši Rally for Third
The Brno baseball teams squared off in a three-game series last weekend. The Draci, who had swept the first series earlier in the month, won the first two games and seemed to have the third game in hand until a five-run eighth inning put Hroši Brno over the top for the win.
The Draci won Game 1 (6-2) and Game 2 (1-8). Then the Hroši won Game 3 (9-7).
Pavel Budský, the 47-year-old mainstay of Czech baseball, played all three games for the Draci. In the first game, he added to his impressive home run total when he hit No. 166, a two-run shot, to put his team ahead for good. Budský also reached a huge milestone when he became the first Czech baseball player to log Hit No. 1,000 in the top league.
The baseball extraliga will now pause for international play. The senior national team, the U-23 team and the U-18 team all have tournaments.
Plus, the 40th Prague Baseball Week started this week with several national teams, including defending-champion Russia, Spain, Sweden and Slovakia.
For updated information and the schedule for Czech extraliga baseball, go to the league website at https://extraliga.baseball.cz/. Use Google Chrome, right-click anywhere on the page and select “Translate to English”.
Czech Baseball Podcast
If you want something extra for your baseball fandom, check out the Czech Baseball podcast. The last two episodes are in English.
The most recent episode features Kotlářka Praha head coach and infielder Scotty Mulhearn and Hluboká infielder and pitcher Wesley Roemer, who once pitched a no-hitter for the Brno Draci. They talked about how the top Czech league is improving, the upcoming Top-Six phase of the season and the quality of the foreign players. Here are the links:
The previous episode, the first in English, featured Mike Griffin, the head coach of the senior national team. It touches on his start with the Czech national team, his initial impressions of Czech baseball, the success at the first European Championship in 2014 in Brno/Ostrava and much more. The link is here.
RUNNING
Plekanec wins Sunrise Marathon
The dawn was striking and the temperature was already high, but, on the longest day of the year, 57 runners completed the Sunrise Marathon on Sunday. Another 46 ran in the half marathon.
Juraj Plekanec won the 42.195 km race in 02:44:55. Michaela Krížová won the women’s category in 03:27:41.
The marathon, which started at 4:48 a.m., had five loops of 8-plus-kilometers that started behind the Olympia Shopping Mall, crossed over the highway and mixed asphalt, dirt and grass surfaces through the fields just south of Brno.
Stephane Denoual, a Frenchman, won the half-marathon in 1:24:56. Slovak Júlia Mastraková was the fastest half-marathon woman, finishing in 1:48:43.
The next events through Behej Brno are the Špilberk Run on Aug. 28 and Brněnská 25 (25 km, 16 km, 8 km) on Oct. 17. See https://www.behejbrno.com/ for more information.
