In 1996 Šebrle achieved a score of over 8,000 points for the first time, reaching 8,210 points at a meeting in Prague. His first big success came in 1997, when he won the World University Games in Sicily and came ninth at the World Championships in Athens. In 1999 he was successful at the World Indoor Championships in Maebashi, where he won bronze in the heptathlon, and one year later at the European Indoor Athletics Championships in Ghent, where he took silver.