Dalibor Motejlek

"I think he, I don't know his name, if it was Pokorný, before that it was someone else, so he expected you to say something, that I would have such morale that I would say, 'Yeah, this one said this and that.' But it didn't happen. There were boys who went out as tourists to the World Cup, maybe they had it paid for them by the [State Security]. I talked to emigrants who cheered for the sport. Whoever it was. I didn't report it. They said to me, 'You've talked to this person and that person.' Based on who was there, I found out that the boy, with whom I played football for twenty years, reported it.

"I took Jarda Honc with me and another runner and another. We were coming back, we stopped at Semmering, they told us, 'You can stay here.' Mr. Mayer offered me to be a coach there, I would get an apartment, he offered me sixteen thousand shillings per month for that time and moreover I would have a ski tow. I say, 'I won't stay there.' I was there for about three days with the boys altogether. Then they went to the embassy and I went with them. It was so confusing there. I said to myself, I don't want to stay abroad. I was not built for it, I have always loved the mountains, Harrachov, Vysoké. But the situation was that one did not know. They gave us potatoes at Semmering, and I don't know what else. I traveled across the border home. I didn't want to go home through Moravia. I went from the Austrian side. At the border, customs officers told us, 'Why are you coming back, are you crazy?' - 'Go back!' We did not go back. We drove to Jindřichův Hradec. And I saw, there was an apple tree alley near Hradec, all the apple trees were cut. There were Russian tanks, there were apple trees on the gun barrels of the tanks. It looked like an orchard, but it was full of tanks. Tanks all over the road. That was horrible horror! Suddenly, there was the crossing of the tracks, I didn't know – was the train coming, or not? One man showed me like that, so I drove, but I didn't believe him. The Russians are the Russians."

“I was relatively in good shape at the time, I was doing well. Even had received support from others. We did not envy each other. Then Remsa approached me; we used to walk uphill, each of the racers had two little boys with them, who would help them carry the skis up the hill. It took almost half an hour to walk up there, towards the mammoth bridge. And, as we were discussing the jump, he said: “Dalibor…”, he used to call me Libor. “Libor, your form is worth the world championship!” So, we had discussed it quickly. I got going faster during the second flight, bounced, and it lifted me up and back down, I had that feeling that I was about to land down when the warm air pressure lifted me up again. That warm air was coming out from those sixty to seventy thousand spectators that were standing there. Everything went so quiet as I landed, I could hear the rustling of the skis. I spun around and heard the massive shout coming from the crowd. And they announced the world record then.”

“That barrier of respect, I do not call it fear, is being eliminated and overcome since the jumper's early years. That barrier of respect is placed differently than it is the case with a regular skier. But, every ski jumper indeed feels a certain amount of respect before his first jump. It disappears then. It disappears with the immediate set-off, as the concentration moves towards the access and the takeoff position so that he can perform it as precisely as possible. About the construction of the springboard: it is no looping that kicks you off. The slope is about eleven degrees at the last four meters, which makes it seventy centimeters below the level. And it goes down the hill; the jumper has to reach that point exactly and then ease the takeoff up vertically, so as the desired aerodynamic flight curve is reached. That (curve) appeared only later with the evolution of the jump.”

“I would swear by Dukla, a team where I had spent thirty years. Morality was present there. Each of the boys was able to fold their belongings; they were punctual, honest in training. And then, the political-educational background began to gain on its importance and other stuff that sport itself did not have much in common with. It did not fit at all regarding the… I did not like it at all."

“About the skis as such: they were made of ash wood. Usually a little wider, they were used for the downhill mostly. They could serve for anything – running, downhill, kids would jump on them. Only later, the skis for jumping were invented, which were a little wider, double-grooved, mostly made of ash wood in our country. Mr. Viktor Nesvatba from Vysoké, who moved to Harrachov, was producing the skis for ski jumping. Mr. Bartoň in Vysoké nad Jizerou, or Mr. Císař in Lomnice nad Popelkou too.”

"So, as I said, this was unpleasant, and another such annoying thing was that when our results started to rise and we were in the forefront and we were coming back, the customs officers at the border cheered for us. But a year passed, we arrived and everything started to change: 'Come on, you bastards, let's check you!' After the excellent results, they inspected our backpacks, skis, ski bags, they disassembled everything. They searched everything. Those were the things when you were looking forward to going home, and now this was happening. I thought: This is not possible! The man was returning, but he was afraid of what was to come."

"I went to school with a boy named Walter Willpuss, his father probably died during the Second World War, somewhere in Russia, probably. He lived with his mother and they legally moved to Germany. He came on tour with us, he cheered for us, I was glad to see him, but going for a beer with him, not anymore, it was not possible anymore. Remsa went for a beer with him, when Bischofshofen finished, he bought to the Kos´daughters, then Kos was a mountain guide and he was in charge of the Mountain Service. Walter liked one young daughter. He bought them presents in the shop, we were three or four racers, I don't know if anyone else. He bought them necklaces with a pendant, I gave it to the girls, they were happy. But a week passed and they immediately called me for an interrogation in Semily at the police station, saying that there could be secret codes in the necklaces and whatever. It influenced me in a terrible style. Those were the unpleasant things."