Vit Prindis | Prague - On the 4th and 5th January 2014, the seventh annual floorball tournament was held in Praha-Troja in the Czech Republic.  A mixture of slalom, rafting, downriver, sprint and polo paddlers came to try out their skills in this new sport. This particular tournament was founded in 2008 by Michal Makovský, who passed away unexpectedly last year.

In his memory, we decided to continue this tournament and it has been named after him. Held in Troja gym, the event attracted 21 teams from all over the Czech Republic and Slovakia. All teams gave great performances and demonstrated the increasingly high standards of the tournament. Many top slalom athletes attended the tournament such as the cousins Hradilek, Prskavec, Beňuš and Škantár ​​as well as many rafting and downriver racing European and World Champions.

On Saturday 4th January, the first group matches were held, with the last team from each group not progressing to the following day’s play-off matches. On Saturday evening, there was a fantastic presentation of professional floorball by players from Sparta Prague and great music from water sports music band Noty. This made for a great atmosphere, with everyone in the boathouse restaurant enjoying themselves and having a wonderful time. Early the next morning the play-off matches started and by lunchtime we knew names of the final four teams who would battle it out for the top positions. These were; USK Prague M, TJVS Kadan, SKP Bratislava and TJ Klášterec.

The boys from Bratislava came out on top, beating all the other teams and earning the second inscription on our new challenge trophy made ​​in honor of Makovský, the founder of the tournament. This win by Bratislava equalizes the number of wins by USK Prague A, the organizers of this tournament. Renamed USK Prague M for this year’s tournament, this team went on to finish in 3rd place after a thrilling duel with the boys from Klášterec city. In the final match, Bratislava battled against last year's winning team Kadaň, and for a long time it seemed that for the first time in history we would see a team win two consecutive tournaments. However, this was not to be and eventually, the warriors of Kadaň had to settle for second place. The medal-winning teams took away prizes from our tournament sponsors; Salming, I'M FIT, Exceed Nutrition and USK Prague (the organisers).

Vavrinec Hradilek, Olympic silver medalist and world champion slalom canoeist from Prague was playing for USK Prague M. When he was asked about the tournament, he said:

This year`s tournament was special as its founder passed away last year. As he was a very close friend to all of us, we were determined to win this for him.

"In the end we lost to the Slovakian favorites in the semifinal, but it was a dramatic, closely fought match. The whole weekend passed in brilliant style with many paddlers from the Czech Republic and Slovakia having fun on the pitches. There were some really tough matches but there was always a really friendly atmosphere."