10.3.2025 / Czech Open - Marek Lazor memorial

Sonkal was not lost in the international competition

The first weekend in March has been a part of the International Taekwondo ITF Czech Open tournament for many years. This year, the very well attended tournament celebrated 30 years since its first edition and Sonkal representatives from Vybíralova Elementary School were there. The two-day competition between 400 competitors from 40 clubs and 12 countries took place in all age groups. On Saturday, the youngest and also the oldest (pupils, adults and veterans) took to the tatami of the Řepy Sports Centre. Jan Bičík captured the first gold metal among the youngest competitors with yellow belts. A few years older friends Honza Hlava and Honza Hudák completed it with bronze medals among green and blue belts. For both of them this is a valuable result, because it was their first start among the higher belts, which they achieved at the beginning of February. The junior category was closed by medals from the sport of combat - Marek Kocum silver and Jakub Matušík gold. They say like father, like son! And in Sonkal this is doubly true. Jakub was imitated by his father Aleš, when he won the gold medal among the "veterans" (over 35 years old) in the line-ups. Sonkal's veterans are at the top level, as Jiří Faltin (multiple European champion) and Jan Dvořáček, who also won gold in the routines on European soil last year, added gold and confirmed his quality at the Czech Open.

Hubert Skála, who won the gold medal among I. Dan (black belt) holders, is a gold medal machine with a slight exaggeration. Jakub Komárek imitated him with silver among II. He was competing in this category for the first time! The highly anticipated adult sparring matches were in the weight category up to 78kg. Hubert Skála, Jan Zachrdla and Ilya Makarov from Estonia did not owe anything to each other and the overall ranking was dominated by Jan Zachrdla, leaving Hubert in third place. We must not forget about the great second place of Šarka Třísková in the sport fight up to 62kg and the numerous medal collection of Jiří Novák - gold medals in sport fight and special techniques, silver medals in routines and power breaking.

Sunday's competition program was reserved for juniors and also here the sonkal players and sonkal girls won a lot of medals. The best results were achieved by Lukáš Sekera - gold from routines II. Dan and bronze from special techniques. Honza Bicik started the competition with a gold medal and his sister Anezka finished it in the over 70kg event.
In the overall ranking of the sections and countries Sonkal took the fourth position behind the Brno section, Estonia and Silla. Full results can be found in the section successes.