“It was difficult. At one point, it looked impossible. But we were able to keep sport going”, says Veronika Zemanova, Head of International Relations at the Czech Olympic Committee.

She was referring to earlier this year, when the coronavirus pandemic first swept across Europe. Veronika was responsible for organising sporting events and tournaments in the Czech Republic, including the European Week of Sport. When the country was locked down, it seemed that all her hard work might be lost.

“It was a stressful time”, recalls Veronika. “At first, many sports events were cancelled. A lot of partners were forced to cancel their arrangements.” Amid all the uncertainty, the Czech sporting authorities decided to move many sports online and to create an app to help people. “We put a lot of energy into getting the word out that many events were still on despite the restrictions”.

Veronika realised that sport was more important at this point than ever. Yet, many people needed encouragement to engage in sports activities. So, her team launched a media campaign called ‘Stronger For Life’ to motivate Czechs to do more sport.

‘Mens sana in corpore sano’ (a healthy mind in a healthy body)

The aim of ‘Stronger For Life’ is to promote physical activity to reinforce both mental and physical resilience and to help citizens to better cope with disease. Veronika’s team also created a manual for schools with information and recommendations.

Using the #BeActive branding, ‘Stronger For Life’ goes beyond just doing exercise and aims to promote the principles of healthy living. “Sport is not just about moving, but about values and relationships”, explains Veronika.

The campaign’s five pillars are

1. optimism
2. positive exercise
3. relationships
4. quality rest/sleep
5. resilience

This message was disseminated through a series of posters showing middle-aged and older people being active, alongside engaging slogans like ‘Stronger for Life…thanks to exercise’. The campaign depicted people doing everyday activities, like walking up the stairs rather than taking the lift, cycling instead of driving and walking rather than taking the bus.

Another key element of the sports campaign was the ‘Versatility Badge’, which aims to motivate children to set themselves sports goals each year. The badge was founded by Olympic decathlon gold medallists, Robert Změlík and Roman Šebrle. It promotes all-round sports development for children, appealing to their natural competitive spirit to vie for prizes for their schools.

The badge was part of the 2020 European Week of Sport. This year, the event was held online and allowed anyone to try 10 different sport disciplines. Cjildren from 123 schools took part in the Versatility Badge final, with Oskol Kroměříž Elementary School winning the overall national finals (for the sixth time). The prize was awarded by two-time Olympic sprint canoe champion, Martin Doktor.

Viktoria and her team also helped to rearrange the European Week of Sport. Thanks to this effort, most of the activities could still go ahead: 389 sports events, of which 168 took place on the BeActive Night (organised in cooperation with the Czech sports for all organisation, ‘Sokol’).

Czech sport stars, including two-time Olympic canoe slalom gold-medallist, Štěpánka Hilgertová, track cycling champion, Tomáš Bábek, and basketball players, Hana Horáková and Ivana Večeřová, instructed children on how to perfect their skills.

Veronika has seen people’s relationship with sport change. “The downside was that many sports clubs have lost members over the past few months, many children lost their motivation to work out, and many professionals were unable to train properly”.

“But on the other hand, most people found that they have more time to do sport. They were able to do it one way or another, and they were very happy to be able to take part in something. That is the positive side.”