ice-skating
The history of the Dutch and their affiliation with ice-skating goes back to the Middle
Ages and even earlier. The first ice-skates were made from cow shanks or cow ribs through
which holes had been hand-drilled to tie them to the feet. The next form of the skate was a
wooden block with a metal strip. This eventually evolved into the curled wooden skate with
steel blades which appeared before 1600.
This was the last step to the combination shoe and skate as we know it today. The skates
were first used as a mode of transportation. The roads were bad and often impassable in the
wet winter season. When there was ice it was a good time for relatives and friends to visit
one another across the frozen waters.
In the Middle Ages it was custom for the lord of the castle to attract skaters to compete
in various activities during the ice period. What was once a mode of transportation soon
became a sport as rules were created among the men to see who could get home quicker from a
certain place. This started the competition sport in the oldest form of speed-skating. The
first skating association was set up in 1840 in Dokkum, Friesland.
In the Netherlands, ice skating was considered proper for all classes of people, as shown in many pictures by the Old Masters like Pieter Breughel and Hendrick Averkamp. In other countries however participation in ice skating was primarily limited to members of the upper classes. Emperor Rudolf II of the Holy Roman Empire enjoyed ice skating so much he had a large ice carnival constructed in his court in order to popularise the sport. King Louis XVI of France brought ice skating to Paris during his reign. Madame de Pompadour, Napoleon I, Napoleon III, and the House of Stuart were, among others, royal and upper class fans of ice skating and ice hockey.
The Netherlands doesn't get much snow, and there are no mountains, so skiing is out of the question. But when it gets cold the county's frozen winter waterways offer ample opportunities for outdoor skating. More than a quarter of the country sits below sea level, so flood control is a major priority. Thus, when canals freeze over, Dutch fans explain that skating on them is cathartic. We have conquered our enemy. Let's celebrate by running our blades all over it!
Ice skating is not only the quintessential Dutch sport, it also underwrites the history, art and culture of The Netherlands. Perhaps most importantly a good freeze provides the Dutch with their one chance to discover a wilderness and an outdoor challenge within their own landscape. Slashed by rivers and canals, pocked with polders, meers and lakes and meshed in a web of interconnecting drainage ditches, the Netherlands are a long distance skater's dream. Thousands of kilometres of potential routes can carry the skater to the heart of a wild landscape, unsuspected and inaccessable, except when frozen.
Though on average February is the likeliest month for ice, warmer winters have meant less skating in past decades and there is little for the aspiring skater to do except be prepared and wait. Sometimes for years at a time. But at the first scabbing of ice across the canals, the Dutch, normally so earnest and responsible, abandon jobs and universities, uttering the traditional schoolchildren's demand of "We willen ijs-vrij" - we want ice time.
In the Netherlands everybody skates. Speed teams, in tight lines, nose to nape of neck, legs pumping in a powerful unison, set the ice whining and vibrating like the rails under an approaching train. Children on double-bladed, tin skates push chairs ahead of themselves for balance. Unlikely looking people in town clothes shiver past. And veteran couples in sensible woollen jackets, arms entwined, sway along like ballroom dancers.
To avoid thin ice under a bridge you have to klune over the road. Klunen, the necessity to hobble, on ones skates, across roads, up banks and around locks, is the skater's nightmare. It is the removal of ones wings, and a return to a toiling everyday locomotion. On the more popular routes old carpets and rubber mats ease the ankle-snapping trudge from one ice sheet to the next.
To get the most out of any freeze, however fleeting, skating clubs throughout the Netherlands are ready to rush into action. They lay mats at kluning points, mark off dangerous spots with wooden "Danger - Thin Ice" signs, fearlessly drive old cars converted into snow-ploughs across the lakes to clear tour routes, and then run those same tours.
The Dutch take pleasure in the eccentric Dutchness of their tours. Stalls along the way provide koek en zopie - cakes and hot drinks. Dour men stamping their hay-filled clogs sit in small booths to stamp tour cards, completion of which allowes one to claim a small medal at the end of the tour. Less than legal entrepreneurs set up speak-easies in the rushes to sell welcome shots of 'beerenburger' and 'jaegermeister' to frozen ice-warriors.
For the few days of ice the country is transformed into a landscape from a Dutch master. Small villages, hayricks, gloomy barns, steaming dung-heaps and frost blasted trees poke from the snow in black detail. Russet cheeked farmers stump past windmills pulling sledges. Moreover, there is an inspiring chasm between the knowledge that factories and towns lay only a little beyond sight, and the bleak feeling that the primeval cold and the gyring of the snow flakes have wiped away all civilization.
A freeze rarely outlives the enthusiasm of the Dutch to skate, and even as the ice begins to melt die-hard skaters are struggling to finish a tocht. A film of water rainbows around their blades, and there are gaping holes in the ice, lapped by wavelets. Skating finishes like that; damply and in a feeling of anti-climax. When the ice has irrefutably gone the Dutch stolidly return to the upkeep of dams, dykes and the economy. All they can do is grease their skate blades and wait for a next winter and the first sign of the next freeze.
elfstedentocht
The most famous of the Netherland's "tochten" (tours) - is the Frisian Elfstendtocht - 'the eleven towns race' - run only in the coldest years when the ice is thick enough to support anything up to 17,000 competitors racing the 200 kms course. This ice-skating marathon has taken place
only several times in the past 82 years, the last one in 1997, due to ice and weather
conditions.
The race goes through 11 towns, covering 125 miles, starting at the Frisian capital of
Leeuwarden down to Sneek, IJlst, Sloten, Stavoren, Hindeloopen, Workum, Bolsward,
Harlingen, Franeker, Dokkum, and back to Leeuwarden.
The Elfstedentocht started during the severest winter of the 19th century, in 1890. It was then that a Dutch sports journalist, Pim Mullier, decided to skate the 11 Frisian towns in one day. He succeeded in 12 hours and 55 minutes. To prove that he had not missed any towns, Mullier made random visits to houses where he had the owners place a signature and the time of the day in a small red notebook. In 1908, the society "De Friesche Elfstedentocht" (The Frisian Eleven towns race) was founded. They organized their first official race in 1912.
The race starts between 5a.m. and 6a.m. in the Friesland Hall in Leeuwarden. There they wait for the starting signal underneath the heating lamps. As they take off, the skaters are confronted with the winter darkness. Some farmers drive out in their tractors and use the headlights to light up the canals. As the skaters progress from one town to the next, their noses and hair turn to ice. Stands offering hot chocolate and "snert", Dutch pea soup, are located along the route. The skaters are followed closely all day by radio and television.
At every town the skaters have to get their cards stamped at the control point, indicating
the time they passed through. Many spectators (about 600,000) show up to shout words of
encouragement. The last 30 miles of the race are the most grueling as the skaters are
confronted with the cutting northeastern winds between Harlingen and Dokkum. The
winner is awarded a gold medal. All others receive a medal, which is fiercely desired. In 1947 less then 10 percent of the contestants reached the
finish point.
A non-competitive tour was introduced whereby the participants do not race against the clock but try to reach the finish point. They have, however, to reach it before midnight of the day they started. Each year the participants start preparing for the big event in the hopes that the winter will be a strong one. For The Netherlands this has developed some of the world's best long distance and speed skaters. The last two races in The Netherlands were held in 1986 and 1997. About 16,000 ice-skaters participated in each race. During the race, strong bonds between the skaters are formed as they help one another along, although many never finish. In 1986 prince royal Willem Alexander took part in the race and his mother Queen Beatrix was there to welcome him at the finish. Alternative Eleven Towns Races by boat and bicycle take place every summer.