Olympiad | I roared with joy and fell to the ground. A great moment for the Czech heartthrob, at the age of 42 he will experience the most beautiful farewell

It’s still fresh, I haven’t knocked myself out of it yet. I think I have a good mentality, but as I knew that I wanted to quit and I had the last chance to get to the Olympics, it was a bit of a bind for me in the last tournaments. Fortunately, the others also hesitated and I went into the last tournament with the lead, only a few people could threaten me, but they would have to win.

When he got to the last four, I left the lobby for the hotel because I wasn’t giving it up. I told myself that I would not watch, and asked my colleague Martin Čapek to write to me how it turned out. Then the message beeped, “Hey, he’s won.” I couldn’t wait to watch the final and cheered for the French. When he broke it in overtime, I screamed at the hotel, my head was spinning and I fell to the ground. The final started 20 minutes earlier, so after that Martin Rubeš, who was in physiotherapy, came to the room, I was lying there on the floor, so he asked what was going on. And I said to him: “Dude, I’m going to the Olympics!” The guys were happy that Alex Choupenitch and I were already two going to Paris, and then it worked out for the whole team, which is great. The guys work harder than me because I can’t do that much anymore. I finish, they go on.

The Swiss were a few points ahead of us, we needed them to go out earlier. During fencing we have to concentrate on our plancha, we didn’t want to look next to each other, but when they were next to us it was difficult. They turned the last game around and made it to the top 16, then to the top 8, which we did too. And the coach was telling us: “Boys, you are not satisfied with the eight? It’s great!” He was right, but we still weren’t. We fenced with the Koreans, who were also fighting for the Olympics, and we made them laugh. Then we were met by the excellent Hungarians, who crushed us from the start, and when a Hungarian leads, it’s difficult. A lot of people thought it was lost, but I didn’t think so. The ending was a heart attack, but Kuba Jurka was unreal. Then we still needed to beat Kazakhstan, we were losing again, but they turned it around, and again Cuba pulled it off fantastically in the last game.

I turned off my phone after Saturday to focus on the teams. And I still haven’t replied to all messages yet. I am very happy for the whole of Czech fencing and for the atmosphere that they create from children to parents through the union. We are a big family that deserves it… We are each from a different city and club, so we will spread the joy of fencing throughout the country. But we haven’t closed it yet.

I can say it now. Last year, after the Cali tournament, I was ready to focus only on teams, because it is very difficult for me to fight in both categories and I did not want to limit the team. But by winning there, I made it a little more complicated. (smile) I appreciate it very much.

I already experienced the World Cup there in 2010 and it had an incredible atmosphere. So I’m also happy for the boys that they get to experience it. Because every individual joy is great, but with a team that joy is completely turbo.

I would really like to, but I don’t know if it will be possible, the tickets were hopelessly sold out. I signed up for the lottery to buy them, but I couldn’t find a card. When I said with exaggeration that it would be easier to get to the Olympics than to buy a ticket…