Martina Sáblíková is a Czech speed skater, a two-time Olympic champion from Vancouver in 2010.
_2018.jpg)
Martina Sáblíková is a Czech speed skater, a two-time Olympic champion over 3000 and 5000 metres at the Winter Games in Vancouver and the holder of a bronze medal over 1500 metres. [1][3]
Olympic and championship successes
She won her three Olympic medals in Vancouver in 2010 as a member of the Army Sports Centre Dukla, where she spent six years and which she left in July of that year. She also won further medals at the World and European Championships and in the World Cup in Dukla colours. [1]
In the 2013 season she won the gold medal over 5000 metres and the silver over 3000 metres at the World Championships in Sochi, despite health problems. [2] When she was announced as a winner in 2013, she was described as a ten-time world champion. [4]
Awards
In the poll for the best army athlete of 2010, announced on 27 October 2010 in the Dům armády in Prague, she won with 665 points in a vote of 87 coaches, experts, ASC Dukla staff and journalists. Second was the sculler Ondřej Synek, who finished 160 points behind her. [1]
On 23 October 2013 she was named Athlete of the Ministry of the Interior for 2013. Second was the sculler Miroslava Knapková and third the biathlete Gabriela Soukalová. [2]
She received the Jiří Guth-Jarkovský Prize for 2010 at the plenary session of the Czech Olympic Committee in Prague. It was her second such award; she had first received it for 2007. In 2010 she was the most successful athlete of the Czech Olympic team. The prize has been awarded since 1934 and is the oldest Czech sports award. It is given to the personality of the year for results at the Olympic Games, European and world championships and other major competitions. The trophy, a goddess Nike on a marble pedestal, was created by the artist Otakar Španiel. [3]
Books and documentary
After her Olympic success in Vancouver, the first book about her was published, with information supplied mainly by her coach Petr Novák. In November 2013 she christened a second, more autobiographical book, Sama proti času, which she wrote with the author Radka Červinková. At the same time a documentary film of the same name was due to reach cinemas, and Czech Television scheduled it for the first day of the Sochi 2014 Olympic Games. [4]