BIO

Monika Pyrek is one of the best Polish female athletes in the history of the sport, specializing in pole vaulting. To her credit, she has two silver and one bronze medal from the World Championships and two bronze medals from the World Indoor Championships, as well as a silver from the European Championships and two bronzes from the European Indoor Championships. Her collection is full of medals from European Cups, Polish Championships, as well as Polish records broken many times (69 times!) and titles (5 times) of the best Polish female athlete “Golden Spikes”.

As many as four times she managed to realize the biggest dream of any athlete to participate in the Olympic Games (Sydney 2000, Athens 2004, Beijing 2008, London 2012). She went to her fifth Games (RIO 2016) as a candidate for the IOC Athletes’ Commission.

Her athletic successes and international prominence have also found special national recognition. President Lech Kaczynski awarded Monika Pyrek in 2009. Knight’s Cross of the Order of Rebirth of Poland.

Monika has been active in sports organizations for athletes for more than 10 years. She was a member of the EAA and IAAF athletes’ commissions, and from 2009 to 2013 she was a member of the PKOL Executive Board and chairwoman of the PKOL Athletes’ Commission. To this day, she continues to serve on the PKOL Competitions Commission and on the Social Sports Council of the Minister of Sport and Tourism.

In 2012 – 2013, Monika ran the “First Step” scholarship fund together with the Fact Foundation. One of the scholarship recipients was Sofia Ennaoui, who is already enjoying international success in middle distance running.

After the end of her sports career, Monika started working for Radio Szczecin, where for 4 years she hosted her own program “Monika Pyrek’s Skirmishes.” Then for the next 4 years she worked as a press officer at Arena Szczecin Operator (manager of the Netto Arena facility), to finally focus only on working on the development of the Foundation’s activities.