Abstract
The analyses of the genre of autobiographical texts focus mainly on canonic texts and literary experiments. However, even autobiographies of famous sport persons offer a rich and productive sphere that has certain impact on the development of the genre norms and practices.
This type of autobiographies favours a pattern of a "path to reach on high". Each distinct narrative, nevertheless, modifies the pattern according to the story of life and the criteria of success in each particular type of sport.
Interpreting the autobiographies of Dominik Hašek, Jaromír Jágr, Toni Schumacher, Franz Beckenbauer, and David Beckham, the essay outlines the specific autobiographical narrative strategies on the levels of composition, motifs, and style. At the same time, it tries to locate such observations into a larger context of the theory of autobiography.
Such exemplification shows that the textual strategies of sport people autobiographies bear comparison with textual strategies of classic literary autobiographies.