University of San Francisco Athletics

Julija Praprotnik ran hurdles for USF.  He is a native of Ljubljana, Slovenia and attended Ekonomska Fakulteta High School.

I am a Blue Book trainee at the European Commission, in the cabinet of Commissioner Johannes Hahn, who is in charge of Budget and Administration. I did my Undergraduate Degree at the University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Economics. During this time, I spent half a year as an exchange student in the Netherlands. After that, I received a full-time athletic scholarship to the University of San Francisco (USF) in California, where I studied Applied Economics. At the same time, I was an NCAA athlete, competing and representing my university. Alongside that, I was a professional athlete for 12 years; I ran track and field, more specifically, the 400 metres hurdles. My biggest achievements were participating twice in the World Championships and four times in the European Championships, breaking the national record in 4x400m relay. The whole time, I combined athletics with my studies. I did not have a gap year and it did not take me any longer to finish my studies. I did it while being an athlete. This meant many hard hours of training and practice, but it was worth it (Wix.com).