EuroHockey Championship II

Recently I was approached by Scottish Hockey to shoot a team of Scotland at an EuroHockey Championship II in Prague. The first two teams will be promoted to Championship in 2017 so the stakes were quite high. The challenge for them was not only to beat the opponents, but also the extreme hot weather and for me personally D1 highway from Brno to Prague 5 times a week with lot of constructions happening during holiday period on the road.

Scotland lost the first match against Poland 2-1 and came strong in next one against Croatia 6-0.

The most extreme weather was on Wednesday 22nd, when Scotland played against Ukraine the most crucial match. A win will move them to semifinals, a loose to losers matches. It was tropical sunny day without a cloud and temperatures around 40 °C! Luckily for Scotland they played in white jerseys :) and with strong finish they beat Ukraine 6-3. 

The team was ready to take on the Austria on Friday semifinal match and secure the promotion post. Unfortunately the match ended 1-1 and it was time for shootout, where Scotland lost 3-1 and had to play for 3rd place on Sunday, which they secured later on with a win against Czech Republic 5-1. 

Though the promotion to EU championship didn't happen, with 3rd place and the tournament top scorer Alan Forsyth and MVP Kenny Bain, Scotland remains strong for the next to come and I wish them good luck in the future.

All images from EuroHockey Championship II are available on World Sports Images. 

Brazilan Party in Prague !

FIVB World Tour Prague Open 2015 was a big Brazilian party ! The girls from Brazil won the 1st, 3rd and 4th place. The only team that squeeze in were Canadians Heather and Sarah. The organizers were quite lucky with the weather, after rainy week, the Sunday was just perfect, cloudy, bud warm and no rain at all.

And guess what :D as usual, just before the match point, a security guy came to handle the photographers ;) "2 meters to the right! everyone! Is there something you don't understand! " haha lucky me I was at a good spot didn't have to move, but the other guys were quite angry, as it could result in missing the shot just after the winning ball. :) this stuff happens almost everywhere :D

Results :

1. Agatha Bednarczuk, Barbara Seixas De Freitas - BRA 
2. Heather Bansley, Sarah Pavan - CAN
3. Eduarda Santos Lisboa, Elize Secomandi Maia - BRA

See all images on WorldSportsImages.com

MMA GCF 31 Cage Fight 6

Friday night - Fight Night ! All fighters unite in Boby Centrum in Brno yesterday to watch an amazing MMA GCF 31: CAGE FIGHT 6 in cooperation with GCF organisation and Brno's team JETSAAM GYM.. There has been 8 fights scheduled, one better than the other. Some were won on chocking some on technical KO. We saw it all. And here are the results :

Light-heavyweight fight 3x5min
Michal Fijalka vs Jiří Procházka – winner Jiří Procházka (Corner Stoppage)

GCF Flyweight title fight 5x5min
David Dvořák vs Tomáš Žák – winner David Dvořák and he is new GCF champion in flyweight (TKO - Punches)

Light-heavyweight fight 3x5min
Arunas Vilius vs Miloš Petrášek – winner Miloš Petrášek (Submission - Kimura)

Middleweight fight 3x5min
Emin Sefa vs Petr Beránek – winner Petr Beránek (Submission - Rear-Naked Choke)

Lightweight fight 3x5min
Saulius Bucius vs David Kozma – winner Saulius Bucius  (Submission -Triangle Choke)

Welterweight fight 3x5min
Marek Bartl vs Bohumil Lungrik – winner Bohumil Lungarik (Submission - Armbar)


Welterweight fight 3x5min
David Ziopulos vs Matúš Juráček – winner Matúš Juráček (TKO - Punches)

Featherweight fight 3x5min
Václav Šťastný vs Jiří Flajsar – winner Jiří Flajsar (TKO - Punches)

See all images on WorldSportsImages

Biathlon World Cup in Nove Mesto na Morave

There is a huge biathlon hype in Czech Republic in the last two years. The team is winning one medal after another and I had a great opportunity to get the accreditation for this year world cup in Nove Mesto. It was my first time shooting biathlon and actually first time shooting outside in winter.

When I arrived on Saturday, we had dreamy sunny weather, no clouds at all. The chief photographer explained the spots where I can shoot, and soon I was ready to go. But as usual, the spot where I should go through was guarded by security guy and he was supposed to let us through (both photographers in blue or grey (priority) vests). When he saw me he said "no no no, only grey vests". You know the story, it happens almost everywhere :D 

So after a while and little bit of explaining he got it and let me through. If you think there was a nice sidewalk to the spot....it wasn't :D I had to go around penalty loop through  this :

But it lead to a perfect spot with excellent view on athletes after the start and the fans all together:

After the men sprint, women started and Veronika Vitkova get the bronze medal ! The crowd was amazing, and the cheering gave me goosebumps many times.

I know from the news that the weather on Sunday will be little bit worse. But this was not what I expected :

I don't get how they were able to shoot the targets. Gabriela Soukalova had a great run and ended up on 5th place due to 2 misses in the last lap.

The camera handle these extreme weather conditions without any issues. Which was great ! But to be honest everyone was looking forward for the award ceremony to get the last shot and run to the press center. Thanks a lot to all organizers, the ceremony was fast and we were not so soaked :D

Here is the Gallery with all images.