Dear Colleagues,

Dear Friends,

I hope that you have all returned home safely from Maribor and are able to enjoy some well-earned rest during the month of August.

I would like to send my sincere thanks and congratulations to everyone involved in the European Youth Olympic Festival (EYOF) Maribor 2023. It was a memorable week not just for the athletes, but for everyone lucky enough to be in attendance in Slovenia. This was the largest multi-sport event that was ever held in the country and everything, from the transport to the standard of the venues, was of the highest quality.

Special mentions must go to Slovenia National Olympic Committee (NOC) President Franjo Bobinac and Secretary General Mr Blaz Perko and Ms Nataša Ritonija, Director of the EYOF, for the role that they played in ensuring the 17th summer EYOF was a success. Thanks to the commitment of your teams and the generosity of the volunteers, Europe’s best young athletes will remember their experience in Maribor for a lifetime.

The performances of the athletes during the week was truly outstanding. We saw 25 EYOF records broken over the course of the Festival. The next generation showed us the future is bright for European sport. The introduction of mountain biking, 3×3 basketball and skateboarding to the programme was also a success with good crowds at all events.

Outside of the sporting perfomances, another highlight was the fantatsic live streaming and social media figures. All the sporting action was live streamed on EOC TV with more than one million viewers and the EOCs own social media channels reached 27 million users across the week. This only goes to show the wonderful appitite for the event, especially by the youth.

Of course, this EYOF brings to an end a busy 18 months which has seen us hold the European Games, four EYOFs and the Games of the Small States of Europe in six different countries. This has shown the strength of the European Olympic Family and it has been an honour and privilege to attend all of them.

My final thanks must go to the EOC staff at the Head Office in Rome for their hard work during this time.

Our attention will now turn towards the 52nd EOC General Assembly in Istanbul in October and I look forward to seeing many of you there.

With EurOlympic regards,

Spyros Capralos

EOC President