The region will send 122 participants to the Czech Winter Olympic Games for Children and Youth. Photo credit: JMK.
South Moravia, Nov 11 (BD) – The South Moravian Region will send 88 athletes in 10 sports competitions, 31 coaches, and three team leaders—a total team of 122—to the Czech Children and Youth Winter Olympics (Winter ODM), taking place in the Hradec Králové Region from 22-27 January next year.
Regional councillors decided on Wednesday 9 November 2022 to support the participation of the South Moravian youth team in the 10th National Winter ODM.
“The region will support the participation of our children’s regional team with almost CZK one million; we will provide CZK 362,000 for the preparation and participation itself, as well as stylish clothing for our team for more than CZK 630,000. We won the summer games, so I am looking forward to the winter event,” said South Moravian Governor Jan Grolich.
Due to the scope of work associated with the preparation and participation of the South Moravian team in the ODM, the region has been working in cooperation with the South Moravian regional organisation of the Czech Union of Sport for several years.
“The Children’s Olympics have the great atmosphere of big sporting events. The games are motivation for many children and young people to work on themselves and stick with sports, and that is no small thing,” said Grolich.
ODM is the most important youth sports event in the Czech Republic. It is a project of the Czech Olympic Committee, which selects individual regions of the Czech Republic as organisers. It is a competition of regional representations of the best Czech athletes aged 12 to 17. The Olympiads take place in two-year cycles, alternating between summer and winter. The first edition of the Summer Olympics took place in 2003 in the Pardubice Region, while the Winter Olympics were held for the first time in 2004 in the Central Bohemia Region. The South Moravian Region has been participating in this project since 2003 and has hosted the ODM twice, in 2005 and 2017.
At the last summer Olympiad in the Olomouc Region, the South Moravian Region was the overall winner, ahead of the Prague Capital Region and the third-placed Central Bohemian Region.