Super Adaptable

January has been a busy and exciting month

The 2017 Fall Classic was the first serious competition of the season for me, racing four days in a row.

I started off with the massstart on Thursday (21/09). Going into the race I had two goals: to grab points somewhere along the race and to finish in the top during the final sprint. The race was one of the hardest massstarts I have raced so far. Everyone was eager to race and due to some breakways the pace was fast the whole race. I ended up snooping up 1 point during the second sprint and coming in 3^rd during the final sprint.

The 1000m on Friday(22/09) was a bit of a different story, I still felt quite fatigued from racing the massstart. So I went into the race with a different plan, I decided to go into the race with one hand on my back. This usually results in a slightly slower pace, but you save some energy along the way thus being able to go faster during the second lap. This plan resulted in a slight PB (1.12.4), bringing me a bit closer to the World cup and Olympic time limits.

I raced the 500m on Saturday(23/09). Overall I felt good about the race, putting down one of my fastest race laps (26.1) resulting in 36.4. The main thing now is to work on getting my first 100 faster, as I feel that is where I can win some time.

The 1500m on Sunday(24/09) was the distance I was looking forward to all weekend, my previous 1500 felt pretty good so I was hoping to get a PB. I started off a bit faster than I usually do, but I also immediately felt that my legs were not as fast as I hoped they would be. My first lap was still within the range of what I wanted to do, but after that I couldn’t keep my lap times down anymore. I finished at 1.51.2, a bit slower than during my previous race.

Overall I’m quite happy about the Fall classic, we had been doing a lot of hard sessions throughout the past few weeks. So it was to be expected that I wouldn’t be extremely fast this weekend, but you still always want to be a bit faster. Going into a recovery week now and working towards the Oval Invitational which is in a little less than a month.

All of the results are available online at: http://results.oval.ucalgary.ca/Competition/Results.aspx (Including the splits)

My week usually consists of 9 to 11 training sessions, splitting it up in: 4/5 ice sessions, 2 weight sessions, 2 specific core/recovery workouts, 2/3 bike ride’s . Monday, Wednesday and Saturday are the most focus days of the week, on these days we do the hardest and most important trainings. Such as high intensity intervals (Wednesday and saturday) and specific technique training on Monday. Tuesday and Thursday are recovery/preparation days, we use these days to make sure that our bodies are ready to go on the following days. Friday is a bit of an inbetween day, doing an technique session on the ice in the morning and weights in the afternoon. Sundays are rest days, I like to stay a bit active by doing very easy stuff, such as a hike in Banff.

I hope you guys liked the video! If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to send me a message.

Calgary was my last trip of the season and I was on a mission. My season had been very good so far, I had put down some good results during the junior world cup and the Universiad in Almaty. I was just missing one thing to make my season complete: World Cup qualification times. My season had already been quite long and  I had had my fair share of travel, but I was determined to try and get the World Cup qualification times, and what better place to do that than in Calgary. To make the most of my chances I decided to split the odds over two races: Canada cup 3 (11/12 march) and the Oval final (16-19 march). To make sure I had time to get used to the ice, altitude and different time zone I left for Calgary on March 6th.

Week one
The first few days in Calgary I tried to get used to the ice as much as possible without tirng myself out too much. Skating in the Olympic Oval proved to be a world of difference from my last weeks in Haarlem. Not only was the speed a lot higher, also the way the ice gripped was very different. I knew that the second weekend was the most important one. It was my plan to get used to the ice as much as possible during the week. I used the first weekend to become accustomed to the speed and peak during the second weekend.

Canada Cup 3
The week had been a bit harder on my body than expected but nonetheless I was excited to race. I
decided to do just the 500 and 1500 meter races, the two distances I thought my chances would be the best in. In the 500 meter I had a bit of a slip during the start which caused my opening to be slower than usual (10.50 sec.) during the lap I got my flow back together and did my fastest lap during a race ever (26.20). Next up was the 1500 meter, I had no idea how that would play out as it would be my first 1500 meter on a high speed rink at altitude. It turned out really well, I made one mistake and that was slowing down to much in the second corner. I wanted to make sure my top speed during the race would be somewhere around 600 meters. To do that I had to pace myself during the second straight and the second corner. I ended up pacing myself a bit to much during the second corner and did a 28.1 sec lap out of a 24.6 sec opener (this should have been a 27 sec low). During the rest of the race I could keep the drops down to about a second per lap and ended up with a 1.51.94, a 2 second PB

Week Two
After having one full day of rest and one that combined a physio treatment with some active recovery, it was time to get back to training. My next race would be on Thursday (500-1000 meters). During the races I noticed my lines were a bit off, so I used Tuesday to work on my lines going in and out of the corners. Corners at high speed a really just a matter of keeping your cool as long as possible, the longer you can stay low and keep on pushing at a steady pace the faster you will go. I did a few 350/400 meter accelerations focusing on getting a much pressure per push (also the lines of course) and a few 200’s focusing more on speed. The next day Daniel and I combined race prep with a bit of video analysis (mainly to figure out if it would be worth it for me to start using a go pro, still not sure about that one). The race prep worked out quite well, my lines felt better than previously and I was feeling confident going into the next few races

Oval finale/ Canada cup 4
The oval finals started off very well, not only did I do a PB by 0.32 seconds on the 500 I also broke the British record, bringing it down to 36.38. Just 0.19 seconds shy of the world cup qualification time. My 1000 did not go as planned, I had a bit of a slip during the first corner and couldn’t find my stride. I ended up with 1.12.75, a 0.13 second pb, I was a bit disappointed about it as I was expecting a bit more after my 1500 meter pb. After the first day of racing I did not have any races on Friday and then a new chance for the 500 and 1000 meters on Saturday. On Friday morning I did a bike ride in the morning combined with a lot of stretching and foaming. In the afternoon I did a dry-land race prep. Next up was my second chance for the 500 and 1000, after breaking the British record on the 500 I was really excited have another shot a 500 meters. My 500 started of well with a 10.2 sec. opener. But during the last corner my hip and groin hurt so much that I couldn’t push through the corner, I finished in 36.48. After feeling that bad during the 500 meter decided to not race the 1000 and get some treatment for my hip/groin straight away. The last distance and also my last chance to get a World cup ticket was the 1500 meter needed to be a rough 1.4 seconds faster than my previous 1500 meter. My plan was force myself to accelerate more during the second and fourth corner, this way I could use my opponents draft as much as possible (I was going to start on the inner lane). My race plan worked out as well as it could have under the circumstances, but during the race something went wrong with the timekeeping. So my split times were not shown during the race, until the last straight I had no idea if I would get a time straight away. Thankfully an extremely rewarding 1.49.90 showed up on the board. It took a while, but I finally had my world cup qualification time (qualifying time was 1.50.5)

Looking back

Even though I did not qualify for the world cups on all of the distances I can look back at a two very good weeks. I qualified for the 1500 meter, got very close to the 500 meter and broke the British record on the 500m. During these two weeks I learned a lot again, skating on ice this fast forces you to become a better skater (or to crash). Most importantly, these last races left me hungry for the upcoming season. Eager to prove that I can also make it on the 500 and 1000 meters.

Calgary/Heemstede, March 24, 2017