Lunde, Arenhart and Vyakhireva join RYT for summer 2025 sessions

In July, the W19 EHF EURO and W19 EHF Championship 2025 are taking place in Montenegro and Georgia, respectively. The W17 EHF EURO and W17 EHF Championship will be held from the end of July into August, with Montenegro again host to the top-tier EURO event and Pristina, Kosovo home to the EHF Championship. 

The Player of the Match events held on the fringe of each tournament will welcome three new ambassadors to the programme, ready to share their experience and inspire the coming generation: Anna Vyakhireva, Barbara Arenhart and back-to-back member of the EHF Excellence Awards Team of the Season Katrine Lunde. All three know what it takes to make it as far as a player can in handball, having each won at least one major title and been named in an All-star Team for a top competition, and all being regular participants in the EHF Champions League for many seasons.

Vyakhireva, Arenhart and Lunde will join the experienced RYT ambassadors Ana Gros, Katarina Bulatovic, Anja Althaus, Andrea Lekic and Carmen Martin.

A total of 314 young players are expected to take part in the six RYT sessions held across the four events this summer. Following that, the new recruits will be part of the RYT programme, with invitations to subsequent camps as well as access to online training sessions and more, all designed to aid their holistic development as handball players and the transition from the YAC category to the open-age elite game. 

The RYT programme was launched in 2019 and has since welcomed a multitude of talents from across Europe, many of whom have by now become well-established players on the top level. The RYT programme also encompasses a “Train the Trainer” arm, which is one of the most recent additions to the offering. Through Train the Trainer, the EHF offer live webinars aiming to empower national federations and clubs in their own RYT activities.

In addition, a RYT app is available, offering a broad collection of specialised digital training sessions covering diverse off-court topics including nutrition, anti-doping, media, dual career, mental fitness and sports law. 

The focus of the sessions held on the fringe of the summer 2025 YAC events will be on acquainting the invited players with that digital RYT landscape, ensuring they know how best to maximise the available resources. The ambassadors will focus on the “game around the game” — the concepts that are not visible on court but are part of the career of an elite athlete. The ambassadors will also guide the RYT recruits through the resources available through the app, as well as participate in a Q&A session with the young players.

The RYT app resources are not limited to members of the RYT programme, with anyone able to download the app and register for online sessions. 

Photos: kolektiff images/Uros Hocevar/Jure Erzen; Marco Wolf