Photogallery from Viessmann Cup Round 1 in Osrblie, Slovakia – Sprint with relay type shooting. More than 90 biathletes in 11 categories competed on December 29th 2017. Heavy snowfall affected the day, particularly the zeroing-in. Certainly one of the most demanding conditions for racers as well as for photography…
The 10th edition of Tennis Champions Exhibition was dedicated to Daniela Hantuchova, who announced her retirement from professional tennis earlier this year. Her three guests were Kim Clijsters, Tommy Haas and Slovak Davis Cup hero Dominik Hrbaty. Additional guests included winning Slovak Fed Cup Team of 2002, various hockey players, Daniela’s colleagues from Slovak edition of Dancing with the Stars and Daniela’s childhood hero Miloslav Mecir. The sold out arena also saw very special appearance of the President of Slovakia Andrej Kiska.
In mid-August 2017, Swiss tennis player Belinda Bencic joined the ranks of Empire Tennis Academy in Trnava, Slovakia. Belinda is working hard on the return to professional tennis after the left wrist surgery in May 2017. After the short meeting with the press, she shared a few laughs on court with her friend Tereza Mihalikova. Afterwards we strolled around Trnava’s historic center to make some off court, leisure time photos.
X-Bionic Summer Tour 2017 is a premier equestrian event in Samorin, Slovakia taking place at the end of July and it’s spread across 8 race days. I always enjoy visiting beautiful equestrian resort and the annual summer events. Unfortunately this year, the author of the courses did not have photographers in mind. Almost every obstacle was positioned for shooting into the Sun. The rest of them could’ve been placed better. This year’s photostory was saved by two evening sessions.
Thanks to roller skis and paved roads in and around arenas, biathlon is also a summer sport. The 2017 Summer Biathlon Championships of Slovakia on roller skis took place at National Biahlon Center in Osrblie on July 22nd and 23rd.
Photos and results from July 22nd: Men’s Sprint Champion: Tomas Hasilla, Women’s Sprint Champion: Paulina Fialkova, Men’s Junior Sprint Champion: Simon Bartko, Women’s Junior Sprint Champion: Veronika Machyniakova.
P-T-S was a renowned athletics meeting held for 50 years in Bratislava, Czechoslovakia. It was part of IAAF Grand Prix elite category and always featured strong field of athletes. In 2016 it was renewed and relocated to beautiful X-Bionic Sphere Resort near Bratislava and it’s once again the top athletics event in Slovakia. The 52nd edition, held on 17th June 2017, featured a variety of competitions. The results were affected by cloudy weather and strong wind.
Events photographed:
Last Saturday of May 2017 was dedicated to aviation – at least in small village of Dubovรก in Little Carpathians, Western Slovakia. The local grass runway was the starting point of various propeller powered aircrafts and helicopters. The performers included Peter Besenyei, a Red Bull Air Race legend and pioneer, The Flying Bulls Aerobatic Group as well as various pilots from Slovakia and Czech republic.
Empire Slovak Open 2017 – the largest women’s tennis tournament is Slovakia saw some amazing battles. This ITF Event with the prize money of 100 000 dollars is often a lauching pad in the careers of young tennis players. I believe this year we’ve seen the future superstars of women’s tennis in Trnava. Marketa Vondrousova of Czech republic (17 years old) claimed the title, defeating Veronica Cepede Royg of Paraguay. With this victory Marketa broke into Top 100 for the very first time and continued her impressive match record. In the first 5 months of 2017, Marketa managed to win 47 matches and recorded only 6 loses. Anastasia Potapova of Russia (16 years old), who is currently the Junior number one, made another notable appearance. She lost to Cepede Royg in a very close semifinal match.
Viktoria Kuzmova recorded the best result for a Slovak player this year with 2nd round loss to Heather Watson. Watson and her british colleague Naomi Broady captured the doubles title. They defeated Renata Voracova and Chia-Jung Chuang in straight sets.
Slovak Fed Cup Team Played the 2017 Fed Cup World Group Play Off Tiea against Team Netherlands on April 22. – 23. Due to the injury of Dominika Cibulkova, the Dutch led by World No. 20 Kiki Bertens were a favorite of this match. In the end, Bertens and Richel Hogenkamp managed to secure 3 necessary points. Netherlands won the tie 3:2 and advanced to the 2018 Fed Cup World Group 1.
Prior to Sunday’s matches, Daniela Hantuchova received Fed Cup Commitment Award as the first female tennis player from Slovakia. It is awarded to players who have shown long-standing dedication to Fed Cup competition and played a minimum of 20 World Group ties or 40 ties at any level of the competition over the career. Daniela has been playing in Fed Cup since 1999 and she led the Slovak team to Fed Cup Victory in 2002.
Elina Svitolina, currently No. 10 in WTA Tour Ranking and member of Empire Tennis Academy currently spends a few days in Trnava, Slovakia. On April 1st she met tennis fans and media representatives during the Academy’s Kids Day. She also spent the previous afternoon training with the young members of TC Empire Trnava. The kids were eager to show their talent to Elina and tried their best shots (notably the boy in yellow t-shirt).
Shot for: Empire Tennis Academy and Tennis Arena Magazine.
