What amazing fans. The NBC television network in the USA did a video feature on the Dutch and speed skating, talking not only about elite level competitions, but also about the Elfstedentocht and Flevonice. But no mention of Kleintje Pils, whom you are hearing oompah-pahing in the background at the Richmond Oval during the Olympics.
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I would have toasted with the old beer ad slogan, "This Bud's for you", but since there was that trademark dispute between Budweiser and Budvar in the Czech Republic, I changed the slogan / toast. And more important, Martina Sablikova grew up training on a frozen pond according to press reports, and the Czech national championships were on natural ice. Check out this video, (or wait through some dialogue and watch this other video I found). Big congrats to Sablikova on a good Olympics so far...gold in the 3000m and bronze in the 1500m, with the 5000m yet to come. Gotta love a skater that has spent so much time on natural ice, or as the Dutch say, natuurijs.
Like everyone else, I was surprised by the Netherland's Mark Tuitert's gold in the 1500m, with Shani Davis getting a silver and Chad Hedrick finishing in 6th. Shani Davis won all 4 world cup 1000m events this season and 4 of 5 1500m events--the only time he didn't win the 1500m was to Hedrick, and Shani set a new world record in the last world cup 1500m. (Hedrick's bronze in the 1000m qualifies as a surprise as he was ranked 7th in the world cup results). Shani also skated 0.07 faster than his winning 1500m time at the March 2009 single distance championships held at the Richmond Olympic Oval. For this season so far, Tuitert was 5th in world cup points at the 1500m, but he didn't skate in the last event. His training may have peaked at the right time, and he was able to skate with abandon yet skate what was for him his own perfect race. Good luck to all the skaters in the Olympic competitions. Both short track and long track speed skating have competitions today. For the USA skaters, the men have a good chance for multiple medals in the 1500m, with Shani Davis favored to win gold. In short track, Apolo Ohno and Katherine Reutter skate in their 1000m and 1500m individual events, respectively.
I mentioned other outlets for information on skating and Olympics news in my last post--for basic information on your local speed skating scene, check out the Clubs & Programs tab on US Speedskating's website. Other than the world class inline skaters that switched over to ice as adults, most speed skaters begin as young kids and compete in various age classes (the Tiny Tot age class cutoff is younger than 5 years old, as I recall, while other kids start out a little older). Its a great activity if your kid wants to get involved. There are also adult recreational classes with Masters age competitions. The 2010 Winter Olympics are upon us! Some tidbits to ponder while Jeffrey Immelt and Jeff Zucker of GE / NBC jealously look at their peers in Korea and Japan, where the upcoming duel in ladies figure skating between Kim Yu-Na of South Korea and Mao Asada of Japan will likely produce a television ratings boffo for their networks (see '88 Katarina Witt vs. Debi Thomas, or '94 Kerrigan, Harding, and Baiul) while Zucker continues to be the butt of jokes about the Leno-Conan programming fiasco. But on to the rest of the Games, which promise plenty of drama and excitement.
A huge congratulations to Apolo Ohno on tieing Bonnie Blair for the most medals by a USA athlete at the Winter Games, and even more so to JR Celski for his bronze in 1500m short track. Just last fall, JR had a horrific accident in one of the last races at the Olympic trials, where his blade caused a deep gash in his thigh. I'm so happy he overcame the mental challenge--he's young and he's going to be around as a skater for a long time and there's plenty of time to recover physically for his future skating career, but the challenge of overcoming The Fear after a terrible crash is definitely a problem in any sport with risk. Okay, I know they would have placed fourth and fifth but for the three Koreans colliding in the last turn allowing Ohno and Celski to "pull a Bradbury". But like the Australian, Celski had to mentally battle back from a horrific injury to just get to where he was in the race. Nice to see Katherine Reutter on the first time Olympic athletes television program that aired just before the opening ceremonies in some cities. I contributed to her sponsorship by buying her Rootin' for Reutter sweatshirt--see her website (note that I'm pretty sure they won't be shipping until after the Olympics are over as Mom and Dad Reutter have journeyed to the games.) I loved the feature NBC did with Mary Carillo talking about Dutch speed skating fans in the Netherlands, the Elfstedentocht, and Flevonice. I'll try to post a link if NBC or Universal Sports puts the video on their respective websites. A few plugs: I'm enjoying the "Sports Center"-like coverage on Universal Sports in the morning at the Olympics. Also, the "Zen" blog on speed skating continues to have terrific, original content on speed skating and is definitely worth following, and even offering up a "virtual tip" to buy the host a cup of coffee. Lastly, beyond the Games, its winter everywhere. There were some skating tours this weekend in the Netherlands. The northeast of the US (Vermont - NH - NY) area is enjoying some great natural ice skating conditions. And one hopes that the snowed-in people in the mid-Atlantic region are creating their own bobseld runs out of the deep snowbanks. I have memories of "The Course" from such a record snowfall from my childhood, where we rode plastic-sheet toboggans skeleton-style down a banked course we iced over--our neighborhood backyard skeleton / bobsled course. We all still talk about it, so if you are a parent in the mid-Atlantic tell your kids to unplug the Wii or the PS-whatever and build their own Course. |
Editor - JimThis blog weighs in on topics such as long-distance skating, the Illinois canals, cycling, and a variety of related (and occasionally not-so-related) topics. I'd like to correspond with others interested in skating the Hennepin and I&M canals. Archives
November 2020
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