Euros: Wednesday - A Silver Medal amidst bad weather

This morning was the racing of yesterday's planned event program but due to bad weather events had to be all pushed back to today and condense the racing from two days into one.

Yesterday was a long day for everyone - waiting around all day just to find out what the decision would be: if racing would go ahead, or be cancelled for the day. Everyone handled the situation perfectly. The team was relaxed and the girls all went for a warm cup of tea and enjoyed some down time. The guys spent most of the day playing poker.

In the evening, once Barbara (Fischer) had decided that the program would be raced this morning, Desly called for a team meeting to tell everyone to make sure they got to bed early to make up for the early morning (and the inevitable long day of racing that follows a cancellation) that was to follow.

Everyone did very well under the circumstances. Michel (Mulder), Elma (de Vries) & Bianca (Roosenboom) all qualified for the 1000-metre finals. Both the men's and women's finals were great to see with Elma taking home the silver medal. There was not a lot of luck in the ladies distance races, with Mariska (Huisman) & Jannitta (Spigt) crashing very early on, while Anniek (ter Haar) had her best-ever result finishing 8th. The boys all skated very well together, working as a team and Sjoerd (Huisman) ended up finishing the Points in 6th place.

The weather today didn't look good in the morning but the sun is starting to come out and over the next few days the weather is forecast to warm up and bring sunny days and temperatures into the 30's. The highlight of the morning was definitely watching Elma and Bianca in the 1000 metre final working together as a team and gaining Elma the silver.

It was very inspirational for everyone to see how it can be done.

This afternoon we are back at the track for the 500 metres and the American relays.

From Gera, Tanya Dobbin