New indoor meet in Prague

[rainbowgirl28]

http://www.iaaf.org/news/kind=100/newsid=47747.html

Bubka, Zelezny and Beijing hurdle stars help to launch new indoor meet in Prague

Jan Zelezny, Sergey Bubka, Libor Varhanik (vice-president of Czech Athletics Federation), Miroslav Cernosek (owner of organising agency Ceska Sportovni), Roman Sebrle, Dawn Harper, Robert Zmelik, Petr Svoboda (c)
Prague, Czech Republic – The Czech capital Prague will see world class indoor athletics for first time this coming winter. A new international meet was launched this week and will be held in the modern 02 Arena on 26 February 2009.

The name of the meet is yet to be confirmed and will be decided based on sponsorship negotiations but the event’s motto is "Meet of Champions".

The Ambassador of the meeting is multiple World Pole Vault record holder Sergey Bubka, who is IAAF Senior Vice President, and the meeting director is another reigning World record holder, javelin great Jan Zelezny.

At a press conference earlier this week, the first competitors were confirmed: The Czech Republic’s Decathlon World record holder Roman Sebrle, and the two Beijing Olympic sprint Hurdles champions, Dawn Harper of USA (women's 100m), who was present in Prague, and Dayron Robles (men's 110m), the Cuban World record holder.

"I ran my outdoor World record in the Czech Republic, why not achieve something similar indoors," said Robles in a prepared statement. Robles had had to return to Cuba having aggravated a foot injury in Zagreb last week.

Bubka confirmed for his part that he was “happy that new meetings are coming in, especially in such an important city as Prague. I’m looking forward to see this as something which will make an interesting impact to our indoor competition schedule.”

Meeting Director Zelezny commented, "it is for me something new. I was thinking for some time to accept this appointment, but as I will have the same people around me who are responsible for the successful outdoor Golden Spike in Ostrava, I am sure we can work together on a very good level.”

Sebrle who plans to contest the 110m Hurdles and Long Jump in Prague said, "I will compete during the indoor season with the aim of defending my (Heptathlon) title from Birmingham in Turin. This meet will be good in my preparation for European Indoor Championships, as I always need competition one week before a champs.”

Olympic champion Harper was optimistic about her own improvement next winter: “I like new meetings and I hope I will be able substantially improve my indoor best at 60m Hurdles, hopefully coming to 7.8sec region." Harper, the surprise Olympic champion, is planning her first European indoor season and has a career best of 7.98 from NCAA's in 2006.

The Czech Athletics Federation is also participating in the meeting organisation and wants to show that 02 Arena could be suitable for future championships at European or World level.

[spaseminars]

I'd love to be a spectator at some European meets .... but probably not Prague in the winter!