The 19th edition of EKAG was spiced up by thirteen records!!!

A three-day, incredible marathon of qualification rounds and finals featuring 2,200 talents from a record 20 European countries produced a whole range of outstanding performances in hot weather. Participants left Brno having set even national records for Malta, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Romania. The excellent standard of the meet was underlined by thirteen EKAG records being broken—records of a very high level, where any improvement means a truly exceptional performance. This year, in extraordinarily strong competition, our athletes did not manage to reach the podium; the closest were Natálka Skálová, Karolína Macenauerová, and Matěj Šiška. At the end, the best performances in each category were announced.

The opening ceremony took place in an incredible atmosphere, featuring the first-ever lighting of the EKAG flame: representatives of all countries ran a relay with a ceremonial torch, and in the finale—amid thunderous applause—the flame was lit by world shooting champion Zina Hrdličková. The evening traditionally concluded with a magnificent fireworks display. I am already beginning preparations for the jubilee 20th edition, which should be enhanced by something special.

Unfortunately, I must again state that the Czech Athletic Federation (ČAS), led by its chairman, remains completely blind and deaf, as it fails to mention the biggest youth meet in Europe, and many participants ask me why ČAS does not write about such an event. So, if you want to learn details about EKAG, visit the federation websites of all the participating clubs, where you will find everything explained in detail. It would apparently be asking too much for the well-paid federation writers, under the chairman’s control, to mention events that someone is able to organize without their interference. A great joke—and a demonstration of total incompetence and self-centredness—is that not a single ČAS representative showed up in Brno for the Brněnská laťka meeting, included in the Silver level of the World Athletics Continental Tour, where eight!!! of the top Olympic high jumpers from Paris appeared in Brno, and even the EAA technical delegate was very unpleasantly surprised by this fact. Let alone that the incredibly weak yet overstaffed press department managed to produce anything positive about world-class performances—for example, I assume that the 203 cm by world record-holder Mahuchikh is noteworthy, since no one has ever achieved such a mark on Czech territory before. Apparently it is more interesting that “Ferdy the Ant” and “Beetle Pytlík” ran personal bests in the middle of nowhere—those are the “guaranteed” news you will find on the ČAS website. Fortunately, these are things that are completely unnecessary for the organization and quality of our own events, and they only prove the emptiness and inferiority complex of a certain group of people.

Already now, everyone is looking forward to the 20th edition of EKAG, which will probably take place on 29–31 August 2025.