Czech Olympic Champion Jan Zelezny planning to switch to Finnish
club
Miroslav Maly for IAAF
18 January 2001 - Prague - Czech three-time Olympic Champion, double World Champion and javelin world record holder Jan Zelezny, 34, starts on Friday his travel to Potchefstroom (South Africa) to prepare for the season, in which is his main goal is a third gold medal in the IAAF World Championships in Edmonton (3-12 August). "I feel now mentally little bit tired after lot of social obligations. I´m looking forward now only to train, eat and sleep. And, of course, to go fishing," he said.
Zelezny, who won in Sydney his third Olympic title in succession with a new olympic record (90,17 m), became for the sixth time Czech Athlete of the Year, he is also Best Czech Sportsman of the Year 2000 and triumphed also in Awards for World and European Athlete of the Year.
After leaving South Africa on April 19 to travel back to the Czech Republic, he formally announced his plans to move to a Finnish club.
"This will be a sport switch, not naturalisation," Zelezny’s manager Jan Pospisil explained.
"When you can’t beat someone, then you purchase him," joked the head of the Finnish firm Jippii!, Iiro Vuorela, before the signing of a contract making the company Zelezny’s exclusive new sponsor.
Zelezny is said to be planning to start on May 20 and June 14 in Helsinki or June 17 in Kuortane, and between June and July he will in the north of Finland take part in the traditional javelin throwing festival. His first start Grand Prix of 2001 will be probably in Osaka (Japan) on May 12. Before the World Championships, he plans also to participate in the Golden League meeting on July 6 in Paris and then on July 17 in the DN Galan in Stockholm, he may also participate in the Goodwill Games and Grand Prix Final in Australia.
"We will see," he says, "what is important is good health. I don´t want to make a lot of starts before the World Championship, even if javelin is in the program of the Golden League. I would like concentrate only on Edmonton," he added.
