When Reičela Taube says that she has been playing hockey her entire life, she truly means it. She first stepped onto the ice in a hockey arena at just three years old. And it did not begin with a child’s casual sliding around the rink or tumbling on the ice in a winter snowsuit. Instead, she arrived fully equipped—with hockey pads, skates on her feet, and a stick in her hands.
Today, Reičela is a student at Jelgava State Gymnasium, where the learning environment, including sports infrastructure, has been improved with support from the European Union Funds. She trains at the Jelgava Ice Sports School and plays for the Latvian National Women’s Ice Hockey Team.
At the age of three, Reičela was diagnosed with a mild form of asthma. Her doctor recommended spending time at an ice rink.
“I started hockey very early—when I was three years old. Doctors suggested that I go to an ice rink to stay active and improve my health. My mother did not want me to take up figure skating because if you fall there, you get hurt. In hockey, you wear protective gear—if you fall, it doesn’t hurt. So I started with hockey right away,” she explains.
Hockey runs in the family. Reičela’s younger sister also plays the sport, while her father competes in an amateur hockey league.
She admits that in the early years she did not understand hockey as a strategic team sport where the goal is to score and win. For her, it was simply a game. The hockey stick felt more like an accessory than a piece of sports equipment, and winning was not especially important. Everything changed when she moved from the U9 to the U10 age group. The coaching staff, teammates, and environment changed, and so did her mindset and sense of responsibility. Reičela began taking hockey more seriously, focusing on training and games, committing herself to improvement, and realizing that she wanted to progress.
Today, Reičela is a tenth-grade student at Jelgava State Gymnasium, studying in the biology and chemistry programme. She hopes to connect her future not only with hockey but also with medicine.
Alongside school, she trains at the Jelgava Ice Sports School, where practices take place at least four times a week, both on the ice and in the gym. Weekends are usually spent competing. For the past four years, she has represented Latvia’s U18 Women’s National Ice Hockey Team and, for the last two years, the Latvian National Women’s Team.
She also plays on boys’ hockey teams in the U16 and U18 age groups, where she is the only girl. She is one of the few female players whose level of preparation allows her to compete at that level. During the brief moments she has between classes and training sessions, she enjoys solving Sudoku puzzles.
Reičela deeply appreciates the opportunity to represent Latvia internationally.
“Playing for Latvia’s U18 Women’s National Team is a tremendous honour. It is important to me that I have the opportunity to represent my country, because not every athlete gets that chance. Being part of the national team has given me a very strong sense that I truly represent Latvia, and that feeling has become much more conscious and meaningful than it was before.”
She reveals that representing Latvia has also strengthened her sense of patriotism. The awareness that she is playing not only for her team but also for her country feels truly special and significant.
Reičela’s dedication, determination, and development in hockey have been recognised both in Latvia and internationally. In 2025, she received the title of Most Promising Athlete of the Year at the Jelgava Sports Laureate Awards.
“Receiving the Most Promising Athlete of the Year award was completely unexpected. I simply do my job and try to give my best. It was very rewarding to receive such recognition and realise that others notice the work I put in, even though I do not usually put myself in the spotlight,” she says.
In January 2026, while competing with Latvia’s U18 Women’s National Team at the IIHF World Championship Division II Group A tournament in Istanbul, Reičela was named the best player in a game against Türkiye. Together with her team, she won the bronze medal. She emphasizes that experience at this level of competition is extremely valuable for athletes.
Despite the fact that school, training, and hockey games have become an inseparable part of her everyday life, Reičela’s primary focus remains her education. Although, as she says, she has always found learning relatively easy, studying is still essential—even if it means doing homework on the way to training at the ice rink or while travelling to competitions in Finland.
“When I do have some free time, I like meeting friends, going to Riga, walking around the city centre, visiting cafés, and simply spending time in a different environment and enjoying things that are not available in Jelgava,” she says.
With support from the European Union Funds, Jelgava State Gymnasium has improved its learning environment and infrastructure, introduced modern information and communication technology solutions, and purchased contemporary equipment. The school’s sports hall was renovated in 2019.
Reičela has studied at the school since September 2025 and stresses that the environment where sports lessons take place is very important. She has always enjoyed physical education classes because they allow her to try activities and skills that are not part of hockey, such as learning proper ball-throwing techniques or climbing ropes.
According to Reičela, her development and achievements in hockey would not be possible without discipline—not motivation or inspiration, but pure discipline.
“Discipline is the most important thing. You have to make yourself do the difficult things because everything valuable requires work. Good things do not come easily. If you want to achieve something, you have to understand that there will be moments when it is not easy, but that is exactly what makes the result meaningful.”
That is also Reičela’s message to all of us: if there is something we truly want, we must be willing to fight for it, dedicate our time and resources to it, because no one else will do it for us.
During the 2014–2020 European Union Funds planning period, municipalities implemented projects under Specific Objective 8.1.2 “Improving the learning environment of general education institutions” within the Operational Programme Growth and Employment. These projects modernised school infrastructure and equipment—including sports facilities—to provide students with safer, more modern, and more comprehensive opportunities for learning and physical activity.
This story was created with the support of the European Union Funds.
