There’s no question that female athletes are strong. From climbing the highest mountains on earth to swimming in brutal ocean conditions to running 26.2 miles at blistering speeds, women have proved time and again that they’re capable of achieving seemingly impossible physical feats.

But female athletes aren’t just strong; they’re powerful. They smash barriers. They fight, tooth and nail, for equality. They transcend sports to become cultural game changers.

The “Open Hour in Sport” was a real challenge for Latvia. First, due to the pandemic that still goes on and a week prior to the activity of “Open Hour in Sport” a teacher of the local Secondary School, where one part of the activity was scheduled, got sick with Covid-19 and one third of the school was isolated. This included also lower grades that were chosen for a mental sport lesson in order to reach a higher aim and a greater value added of this activity, which was to attain children of grades 1 – 4 to enter the local sport school and continue doing physical activity and sport after this one marvelous day. In this regard, the project team invited the sport school’s representative to say a welcoming speech to the young children and invite them to join Limbaži Region Sport School, which by the way, is free of charge in any of the seven sports available in the sport school. After the welcoming speech, the sport school’s director handed booklets for the teachers of the children of grades 1 – 4 to be later handed to the children themselves so that they can decide together with their parents for any future choices.

Inspired by an Olympian

After the sport school’s director, the floor was given to an Olympian who ranked 7 in the Beijing Olympic Games in sprint canoe – Kristaps Zaļupe and a sports teacher Kalvis Rudzītis. The specific task of the Olympian was to inspire the children by his personal story of his Olympic road. Meanwhile the sports teacher, who is also a lifeguard of the beach shared stories of the necessity to be physically developed to be able to save not only themselves but also help other people in case of a necessity. Both men involved the children in their stories as sample models.

Magic of Sports

Yet, the “star” of the event was a magician invited to keep inspiring the children for continue doing physical activity through a specific story combined with magic tricks that children love so much. Toms Felkers – the magician, was also promoting the team spirit in the children as much as it was allowed according to the school’s rules because of the pandemic situation. Even though Toms was strictly limited in his actions, he did the best to involve all children – grades 1 – 4 were allowed to step down in the sport hall, the rest was allowed to stay in sport hall’s stands only.

Sports in Nature

Another activity with the “Open Hour in Sport” a running event “Around Lielezers” for all ages, for all levels and for different length distances – 600m (60% asphalt, 40% forest trail), 1200m (40% asphalt, 60% forest trail), 6km (70% asphalt, 30% forest trail) and 14,3 km (40% asphalt, 40% dirt road, 20% forest trail and wooden plank-way). Running as such is popular in Limbaži Region. Therefore not only individuals participated, but families involved running together in the pace of the slowest family member – not striving for winning but having fun out of being together and spending time in fresh air.

And the last but not the least – all those who were willing to do a physical activity in a joyful atmosphere and without a result, were invited to have a walk or run of 1000m along the bank of the lake Lielezers with 9 obstacles – exercises possible to do on the spot at each of the obstacle point. This activity was mostly esteemed by elderly people, young mothers with small children either in still in strollers or just making their first steps.

All in all the activity “Open Hour in Sport” gathered more than two hundred participants, 115 of which were students of grades 1 – 4 – our main target audience because of the long-lasting impact that the project team was hoping to initiate in the children by joining the local sports school.

The event is memorized in a video HERE.

Project consortium of the Erasmus+ Sport project "Training to Win" finally found a chance to hold the first transnational meeting in Sangalhos, Portugal along with an International Seminar for coaches and a Battery Test of BMX riders.

The first two days 6th and 7th of September were scheduled for the International Seminar for coaches from six countries both - face-to-face and online. Latvia was represented by 246 coaches who participated and followed the seminar online and additional 2 BMX coaches - Olafs Lakučs from Valmiera Sports School and Renārs Auga from Smiltene Children and Youth Sports School, who participated in the face-to-face event. Along with the BMX coaches, the project manager Sandija Zaļupe of the Latvian team also participated in the International Seminar and was appointed to moderate the round table of athletes - BMX riders. Whereas Olafs Lakučs was intrusted to give the closing speech, which was nicely appreciated by the face-to-face participants, especially BMX riders - the future of BMX world.

The International Seminar was followed by the first transnational meeting of the project consortium. The meeting took place in the following two days at Sunlive Hotel. The main points discussed within this meeting were the first intellectual output - the Need's Questionnaire, which was finished in June and the second intellectual output - the Battery Test that was almost finished but at the beginning of the transnational meeting event was still going on with the last tests of BMX riders mainly concerning lactate after the workloads. Latvia was represented by two BMX riders - Mārtiņš Emīls Treimanis and Dāvis Jānis Elberts, as well as by the BMX coach Renārs Auga participating in all Portugal's events including the Battery Test, where he was acting as an athlete not coach. An important issue discussed was monitoring and control of the project process and an extremely important integral part of the project - the dissemination of all project results.

The Battery Test gave the young athletes an opportunity to meet each other and get acquainted similar to youth mobilities also promoted by the Erasmus+ Programme. It was represented by BMX riders from four out of six participating countries of the project: Latvia, Spain, Portugal and Slovakia.

All three events are memorized HERE and HERE.