The Czech Ski Association has chosen to replace head coach Ladislav Rygl. Largely based on the results at the Nordic World Ski Championships in Falun which fell short of the expectations, the Nordic Combined Board replaced Rygl with his former assistant Vladimir Smid. Smid prevailed over applications from Rygl’s predecessor Ludek Sablatura, who ended his cooperation with the Russian team and former Polish head coach Jan Klimko.

Smid now has time until the 10th of May to come up with a plan for new team staff but due to financial reasons, he will have to make do without an assistant coach in the upcoming season.

„2016 is a year without title events and a good chance to rebuild the national team. Due to the reduced number of athletes, we nominated only one coach. We rely on the fact that Smid has had a close cooperation with our best athlete, Miroslav Dvorak, since the junior category.“, Radek Cikl, the Chairman of the Nordic Combined division on the Ski Federation explains.

With the retirements of Czech veterans Pavel Churavy and Tomas Slavik, as well as Lukas Rypl, the team will be undergoing major change in the next season. It also urgently needs international success as this year’s budget of 1.812.000 crowns assigned by the Czech Ski Federation only represents 49.8% of the budget of 2014.

Former athlete Tomas Slavik will remain involved in the sport after a chronic knee injury forced him to retire. Not only is he the new representative in the FIS Sub-Committee for Officials, Rules and Control, he will also take over the post of the Czech Sports Director for Nordic Combined.