Track-and-field athlete Natalia Kaczmarek and volleyball player Bartosz Kurek were each awarded the Commander's Cross of the Polonia Restituta Order during a ceremony at the presidential palace in Warsaw on Monday, state news agency PAP reported.
Kaczmarek won a bronze medal in the women's 400 metres, while Kurek captained the Polish men's volleyball team to a silver medal at the Games in Paris.
Other Polish medalists from Paris also received state awards, including Olympic champion Aleksandra Mirosław, who won gold in the women's speed climbing event.
Mirosław was presented with the Officer's Cross of the Polonia Restituta Order on Monday, as were her husband and coach Mateusz Mirosław, volleyball player Paweł Zatorski, and rowing coach Aleksander Wojciechowski, the PAP news agency reported.
Polish athletes claimed 10 medals—one gold, four silver and five bronze—at the Paris 2024 Olympic Summer Games, which were held from July 26 to August 11.
The medal tally marked Team Poland's worst Olympic performance since the 1956 Melbourne Games, placing it 42nd in the overall table in Paris.
A total of 211 athletes represented Poland at the Games, competing in 22 Olympic sports, including more than 60 track-and-field contestants and 20 swimmers.
The Polish delegation also included more than 200 coaches, doctors, physiotherapists and support staff.
Polish athletes returning from the Paris Olympics are given a warm welcome at Warsaw's Chopin Airport on Aug. 12, 2024. Photo: PAP/Leszek Szymański
Polish athletes brought home 14 medals, four gold, five silver and five bronze, from the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Summer Games, the national team's best haul this century.
At the Rio Summer Olympics in 2016, Poland won 11 medals, two gold, three silver and six bronze.
At the London Olympics in 2012, Team Poland scooped 10 medals, three gold, two silver and five bronze.
The next summer Olympic Games will be held in Los Angeles in 2028.
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Source: IAR, PAP, TVP, olimpijski.pl