The European Youth Olympic Festival will be hosting their first skate contest as part of their 2023 event in Maribor, Slovenia, from the 25-28th of July.

The street-format contest will be held at the city’s Skatepark which was completed in 2019 and has already hosted contests such as a leg of Blue Tomato’s Best Foot Forward series.

Maribor is Slovenia’s second city and lies on the banks of the picturesque River Drava in the North-East of the country which gives it great access links from neighbouring nations who will be coming in their droves for the 17th edition of Europe’s leading multi-sport event for athletes between the ages of 14 and 18, the European Youth Olympic Festival (EYOF).

Over 3,600 elite teenage athletes from 48 European countries will compete at the highest level in the ten sports on the programme, now including skateboarding for the very first time!

Organised every two years by the European Olympic Committees, the EYOF is considered to be a key stepping stone for young European athletes wanting to achieve Olympic glory, giving them a first taste of what it means to compete at an Olympic-style event, and encouraging them to go on and compete at the Youth Olympic Games, then the European Games and finally the Olympic Games.

Practice will be open for 4 days from 22nd until 25th of July, with qualifiers on 26th and finals on 27th. The qualification format will be 2 x 45 second runs with best run counting, and the finals will follow the established Olympic 2-5-3 format. 20 European countries are sending young skateboarders for what looks like being a fantastic new event.

So far, we know that in attendance will be Caspar Rupp-Goldgruber, Noah De Jaeger, Richard Brezina, Vitas Sondrup, Mikael Skytta, Max Berguin, Petre Bunturi, Anton Wessely, Christos Katsavrias, Yakov Terrel, Andres Martin, Ernests Grobins, Povilas Jucys, Diego Broest, Johannes Aasheim, Jean Semaan, Madu Teixeira, Klemen Boc and Simon Gerber for the Men; in Women’s, we will see Julia Placek, Ella Naessens, Nikol Jenikova, Smilia Alsbirk, Valentina Krauel, Cerise Michaud, Maria Panagiotaki, Shani Paz, Ruta Grinerte, Christina Steens, Maja Spatscheck, Weronika Choromanska, Rafaela Costa, Lina Sevcnikar and Liv Broder all showing out at Maribor’s mega outdoor skatepark!

We want to wish all the skateboarders entered every luck in this great new platform for skateboarding in Europe!