Kopřivnice will build a statue for its native Emil Zátopek

Kopřivnice - The town of Kopřivnice in the Novojičín region will build a bronze statue of its native Emil Zátopek, a four-time Olympic champion. This was approved by the representatives, David Macháček informed ČTK on behalf of the Kopřivnice town hall today. The statue is expected to be unveiled in September 2022 during the celebrations of the 100th anniversary of Zátopek's birth. The work is to be created by academic sculptor Jaroslav Brož, who is the author of the Zátopek statue that has stood in the Olympic Museum park in Lausanne since 2002.

The representatives have not yet agreed on where the statue will be placed. "Part of the representatives advocates for placing the statue in the town center, while others would prefer to see it in front of the Lašské Museum, which is to be transformed into a museum of local natives with a new exhibition on Emil and Dana Zátopková," stated Macháček. The deputy mayor of Kopřivnice, Dagmar Rysová, said that the public will also have the opportunity to speak in the discussion on where the statue will be located.

The statue is estimated to cost around 1.5 million crowns. The city leadership wants to use public fundraising for its financing.

The newly conceived museum exhibition of the Zátopková couple is to be moved from the premises of the Tatra Technical Museum to the Lašské Museum, which is to gradually be transformed into a museum of Kopřivnice natives. The exhibition is expected to open before the start of the tourism season in 2022.

Zátopek won four gold and one silver medal at the Olympic Games in London and Helsinki in 1948 and 1952, including a triple combination of distances in the 5000 meters, 10,000 meters, and marathon. He also competed in the marathon in Helsinki for the very first time - and broke the Olympic record by six minutes. A three-time winner of the world's best athlete poll, he was declared the Czech Olympian of the century in 1999. He died in November 2000. His wife, Dana Zátopková, who passed away in March this year, was the Olympic champion in the javelin throw from 1952.