TOTH Matej

General
CLEARED AFTER PROVISIONAL SUSPENSION
In July 2017 he was provisionally suspended after anomalies in his athlete biological passport were detected in a blood sample from 2016, which he claimed were caused by a low haemoglobin level. As a result of the provisional suspension and subsequent investigation he missed the 2017 World Championships in London, England. In October 2017 a disciplinary committee of the Slovak Athletic Federation [SAZ] cleared him of any wrongdoing, and accepted the anomalies had been caused by the natural physiological state of his body. The Athletics Integrity Unit [AIU] decided not to appeal the SAZ decision, and he returned to competitive action in January 2018. "After all that I went through in 2017, I felt that I wanted to share my story with people. I wanted to show that seemingly impossible problems can be overcome and inspire people to never give up. I didn't do anything wrong, I always played fair and people believed me." (worldathletics.org, 20 Mar 2021; olympic.sk, 01 Jul 2019; insidethegames.biz, 06 Oct 2017; sportsintegrityinitiative.com, 28 Dec 2017; soda.o2.sk, 10 Aug 2018)

SPORTS ACADEMY
He launched the O2 Matej Toth Sports Academy in Slovakia after the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, in order to encourage children to get involved in sport. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the academy produced online exercise videos to help children to continue to remain active during lockdown periods. "The videos have been extremely successful with almost one million unique views, which is a really nice number and proof that they are used by many teachers and parents. The exercises are not demanding at all and it is important for the children to get up from the couch and move. Many children only play sport in physical education classes and, with the advent of the pandemic, most no longer play sports at all. We have tried to get as many children as possible active remotely in the online world." (trend.sk, 15 Feb 2021; soda.o2.sk, 10 Aug 2018)

OTHER ACTIVITIES
He has served as a member of the Slovak Olympic and Sports Committee [SOSV] Athletes' Commission and as a member of the IAAF Athletes' Commission. (IAAF, 26 Nov 2015; matejtoth.sk, 27 Dec 2013)

He became the first athletics competitor representing Slovakia to win a medal in the sport at the Olympic Games when he took gold in the 50km walk at the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro. (SportsDeskOnline, 22 Mar 2021)

At the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro he became the first male athlete representing Slovakia to compete in athletics at four editions of the Olympic Games. (SportsDeskOnline, 23 Mar 2021)

In 2015 he became the first athletics competitor representing Slovakia to win a medal in the sport at the world championships when he was victorious in the 50km walk at the 2015 edition in Beijing, People's Republic of China. (SportsDeskOnline, 22 Mar 2021; IAAF, 19 Aug 2016; bbc.com, 29 Aug 2015)