The day of Olympic knowledge

Another academic year began quite unusual for 46 Minsk preliminary and secondary students. Instead of traditional school meeting on September 1, almost half a hundred of 4-11 form pupils visited the National Olympic Committee HQ to celebrate the event with top Belarusian athletes Darya Domracheva, Anton Kushnir, Aliaksandr Bahdanovich and Nastassia Yatsevich.

According to the young guests, the most important piece of advice was not to give up.

"Darya Domracheva advised to always fight till the end. I do judo myself and I know what the real competition is. Darya reminded that opponents find it difficult as well, and that’s why I won’t worry about and be afraid anymore. My heroes are Darya Domracheva and my dad," shared her impressions the student of school №223 Ellina Gromyko.

Diana Grigorenko was surprised by sincerity of the famous athletes: 

"I haven’t expected that Darya, Alexander, Anton and Nastasia are so sociable . I thought they wouldn’t be interested in talking to us. However, they are joking and answering all questions. And they share their experience with us".

Young biathlete from school №209 Anatol Shtunder said this lesson was very useful for him:

"Darya Domracheva told us what we need to do before competitions, how to get emotionally and physically ready. Moreover, I realized that one should always pursue their goal. Now I’m going to follow all recommendations of my role model".

"I want to thank the organizers for the opportunity to attend such an interesting event instead of being at school. By the way, I am the only one in my class who has such assignment book. Therefore, I have to study harder to have good marks in it. I have taken into consideration Aliaksandr Bahdanovich’s bit of advice to spend days-off productively. I like him, and it was really pleasant for me to meet him", told judoka Ruslan Golushko from school №223.

Klim Gnedchik turned out to be the best pupil of the Olympic Lesson. He asked questions to all famous teachers.

“I just saw Darya Domracheva and Anton Kushnir on TV while watching the Olympic Games. I wanted to chat with them. That’s why I wasn’t afraid to ask them, it was complicated to come up with questions”, he said. 

It was not the first Olympic Lesson for Ilya Davydenko:

“Year by year Olympic Lesson only get better. It was intriguing to talk to our champions. I am the student of the 11th form, so I have to decide what to do upon finishing school. I am going to zero in on taekwondo I have been doing for a couple of years. Sometimes I wish I quitted sport. Today I learnt that all athletes used to think so. The thing is that such thoughts must be overcome.

Anton Gordeichik from school №47 frankly admitted he dreams of Youth Olympic Games he learnt about from Buenos Aires 2018 Young Ambassador Anastasia Lesik.

The youngsters are sure the academic year will be full of achievements in sport and education. The most ambitious promised they would hold the Olympic Lesson themselves. Let it be so!