Slovak NOC News
13 January 2025 - Find here the latest news from the National Olympic Committee: events, courses, general assemblies and elections, trophies and much more.
13 January 2025 - Slovak Olympic boxing champion Ján Zachara died on 2 January at the age of 96 in Nová Dubnica. A long-time successful boxing coach, and the first Slovak holder of the title of Sports Legend, Zachara was also the oldest living Olympic champion in Slovakia. He won his Olympic gold medal at the Olympic Games Helsinki 1952 in the featherweight category. He also competed at the Olympic Games Melbourne 1956, before ending his sports career in 1960 as a man who won 365 out of 430 official matches. During his life, Zachara received many distinctions, including the Olympic Order, a Fair Play Diploma from the UNESCO International Fair Play Committee, the NOC Golden Rings and the NOC Golden Badge. The NOC named its annual trophy awarded to a long-term extremely successful youth coach, the Ján Zachara Award. Read more here.
08 November 2024 - Anton Siekel has been re-elected as President of the SOSC. The decision was taken by the SOSC members during the NOC’s 67th General Assembly in Bratislava. The new SOSC Executive Board will have strong athlete representation, with eight Olympians among its members. Siekel has held the position since November 2016, and was previously re-elected in 2021. Info at www.olympic.sk.
15 July 2024 - Nearly 50,000 sports enthusiasts of all ages participated in the Olympic Day celebrations in June. This year, the activities were closely connected with the "Our Colours, Our Hearts" relay, which is promoting the Olympic message across Slovakia ahead of the Olympic Games Paris 2024. In the spirit of the motto "Let's Move!", kindergartens, primary and secondary schools, regional Olympic clubs, sports clubs and local communities joined the celebrations and organised dozens of events with a unique atmosphere. Up to 218 events were registered on the NOC website and proposed a variety of sporting activities, from running races to sports games and educational programmes on the Olympic values. More info here.
17 June 2024 - 100 years ago Slovak athletes competed at the Olympic Games Paris 1924 for the first time under the Czechoslovakian flag. However, none of the Olympic Team official uniforms from that time were preserved, either in Czechia or in Slovakia. This gave the NOC the idea of creating replicas of the original clothing from Paris 1924. The idea also attracted the interest of theatre costume and set designer Professor Peter Čanecký. Thanks to the skilled hands of the Slovak National Theatre’s Art and Decoration Studio, the original leisure suits and sports outfits from 1924 have been recreated. The public will soon be able to see the replicas at an exhibition at the Slovak Olympic and Sports Museum, entitled “Remembering Paris, Tokyo and Los Angeles”. More info about the 4F Slovak Olympic collection for Paris 2024 can be found here.
22 April 2024 - On 14 April, the NOC launched a series of activities for the Olympic Games Paris 2024 under the title “Our Colours, Our Hearts”. Besides celebrating the Games, they will promote the Olympic values and the ideals of fair play. Hundreds of events will take place throughout Slovakia during the next three months. The activities were kicked off with a relay during the National Run Devín - Bratislava, in which Olympians, Paralympians, young athletes, NOC staff, partners of the Slovak Olympic team, members of regional Olympic clubs, the Slovak Olympic Academy and the NOC´s Fair Play Club took part. In total, there were more than 140 participants. The NOC has also launched an Olympic postcard and video postcard project, an art competition and an Eco-Olympics for the pupils and students throughout Slovakia. The Paris 2024 Olympic Festival in Slovakia will be held around the Kuchajda lake in a New Town part of the Slovak capital from 25 July to 11 August, close to the House of Sport and NOC Slovakia headquarters. There will be sports, cultural, fun and educational activities every day, and live Olympic coverage from Paris. More details here.
30 May 2023 - On 23 May, the National Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Slovakia and the Slovak Olympic and Sports Committee signed a memorandum of understanding to strengthen collaboration with the Olympic Movement and sports associations in Slovakia. The MoU was signed at the NOC headquarters by the Head of the UNHCR National Office in Slovakia, Danijela Popovic-Efendic, and NOC President Anton Siekel. The partnership aims to expand the use of sport and strengthen engagement with sports associations and sports stakeholders to benefit refugees and other forcibly displaced people through participation in sport at all levels. This is also the first MoU between UNHCR and an NOC in Europe. More info here at www.olympic.sk.
14 June 2022 - On 1 June, on International Children’s Day, almost 1,500 children from kindergartens, elementary schools and high schools from the Banská Bystrica region and other parts of Slovakia gathered in the SNP Monument Park and celebrated Olympic Day. The celebration was organised by the Slovak Olympic and Sports Committee (SOSC) in cooperation with the Organising Committee of the XVI Summer European Youth Olympic Festival (EYOF), Banská Bystrica 2022. During the official opening, IOC Member Danka Barteková, accompanied by volleyball player Alexandra Fričová and volunteers representative Tomáš Kubica, brought the Flame of Peace that had been lit at Ara Pacis in Rome, Italy, on 31 May for the EYOF 2022. In addition, 400 children took part in the Olympic Day run, and the winners were given their prizes by Olympic champions. During May and June, almost 500 Olympic Day events were organised across Slovakia, with the motto “Move, Learn, Discover, Together, for a better world” and the main theme of “peace”. This year, Olympic Day was also supported by the schools participating in the Olympic Culture and Education Programme (OCEP). OCEP is a joint SOSC-EYOF 2022 project, based on a cultural exchange between Slovak school children and their peers from European countries. More info at www.olympic.sk.
10 May 2022 - The Slovak Olympic and Sports Committee recently announced that Slovak sports organisations and clubs have so far registered more than 400 athletes from Ukraine joining the training process in Slovakia since the outbreak of the war. Moreover, hundreds more children from Ukraine are playing sport in Slovakia in various school sports clubs. Many young Ukrainian athletes have already been given the opportunity to transfer to Slovak clubs, not only to train, but also to participate in events and take part in international competitions. Info at www.olympic.sk.
10 September 2021 - Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the Slovak Olympic and Sports Committee (SOSC) decided to move its Olympic Day activities online, as part of a “Ready for Tokyo” virtual relay. More than 2,200 teachers and students registered for the 23 webinars organised on the topics of Olympic values and symbols, fair play, environmental education, anti-doping and nutrition. A total of 520 competitors took part in the Olympic quiz, answering questions about the Olympic Games, Olympic symbols and mascots. Some 73 mostly primary schools submitted 880 artworks in the art competition. In total, 247 Olympic Day events were organised, attended by more than 32,000 participants. More info at www.olympic.sk.
01 February 2021 - Last December, the Slovak Olympic and Sports Committee (SOSC) launched the Zdravensko campaign, a new long-term campaign focusing on healthy living, joined by Olympic athletes like Matej Benus, Zuzana Rehak Stefecekova, Richard Varga, Barbara Mokosova and Danka Bartekova, who is also IOC Member. The motto of the campaign is Let Us Invest in Health instead of Healthcare. The campaign will gradually motivate Slovaks to live a healthier life, with the help of the nation’s top athletes. The SOSC will call on experts in nutrition, medicine and movement to help in the fight against lifestyle diseases and raise awareness about the benefits of a healthy lifestyle on our immunity. More info at www.olympic.sk.
05 October 2020 - After last year's inaugural edition of the largest sports conference in Slovakia – SPORT (R)EVOLUTION – the Slovak Olympic and Sports Committee (SOSC) organised its second edition online due to the current anti-pandemic measures. The conference, attended by around 650 participants, featured a diverse range of sport-related topics, including the new challenges for the Olympic and sports movement, re-planning the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, marketing from behind the Olympic rings, and behind the scenes at the National Hockey League (NHL). The conference included 13 discussions and one talk, and involved contributions from over 35 speakers. Among the key speakers from Slovakia were IOC Member Danka Barteková; SOSC President Anton Siekel; and member of the FIBA Basketball Hall of Fame, coach Natália Hejková. In addition, four international speakers took part remotely, among them the IOC Head of NOC Games Services, Toshio Tsurunaga, NHL player Brent Seabrook and certified NHL Players’ Association agent Gerry Johannson. More details at www.olympic.sk.
22 May 2018 - The Slovak Olympic and Sports Committee (SOSC) launched a new initiative entitled “Ready to Help*”* at the end of March. In the framework of this initiative, the Slovak NOC has created a solidarity fund aimed at helping athletes and sports organisations seriously affected by this unprecedented crisis, as well as the institutions fighting on the front line against the spread of COVID-19 in Slovakia. The SOSC used its own marketing revenues and financial resources from the SOSC Foundation to start this fund. SOSC employees also decided to participate in this initiative with a monthly donation of 10 per cent of their salaries. More info at www.olympic.sk.
1st October 2018 - On 22 September, the Slovak Olympic Committee celebrated its 25th anniversary with a gala evening, "The Road to Olympus", in a new building of the Slovak National Theatre. The event was broadcast live on national TV. Among the guests were EOC President Janez Kocijančič and representatives of 16 European NOCs. The IOC was represented by IOC Member in Slovakia Danka Bartekova, who co-hosted the celebration. The gala paid tribute to Olympic medallists and Olympians, including Jan Zachara, the oldest living Slovak Olympic champion, who has celebrated his 90th birthday. The gala also honoured the numerous NOC activities promoting the Olympic ideals among young people. The 100th anniversary of the Czechoslovak Republic was also celebrated in the presence of many guests from the Czech Republic. Two Slovak sports legends, Anastasia Kuzmina (triple Olympic champion in biathlon) and Matej Tóth (Olympic champion in the 50km walk) came to the stage with Olympic torches, and representatives of the young sports generation took over the symbolic "fire" relay. This was then followed by almost two dozen Olympic medallists aged 35 to 90 taking to the stage. More info at www.olympic.sk.
9 July 2018 - Olympic Day was celebrated in Slovakia from early May to the end of June, culminating with a celebration on 22 June in Bratislava. In total, over 60,000 people took part in the 350 events organised in over 100 cities and villages across the country. In Bratislava, the Slovak NOC organised various sports activities along the Danube in which many children took part and were able to meet 13 Slovakian Olympians. All the children received an Olympic Day souvenir T-shirt. As part of the “Take it sportingly” campaign, the NOC called on the public to go to work and school in sportswear. National TV widely broadcast the campaign. The NOC also organised an interstate quiz, a drawing competition in which 99 schools participated and a literature contest. More details here.