A Skating Legend’s Icy Ambitions

Rien de Roon was at the top of Dutch long-distance ice skating for years. He’s the Dutch marathon ice skating champion, completed three Elfstedentochten (+200 kilometres) and today, he gives lectures to companies about his sports past. 

Kaat de Mossel is a lunch restaurant in Rotterdam, beloved of sportsmen and famous for its fresh fish. As I enter the dark wood-panelled room and attempt to orientate myself, a waiter comes up to me immediately. ‘Are you here for Rien? He’s at the back.’

Nine Hundred Jumping Jacks in Shoe Storage

When Rien starts talking, he does so with unprecedented energy. After all, he is a motivational speaker. He shares anecdotes from his sporting days and the secrets of his mental toughness with top companies. ‘During long-distance skating, there are going to be moments that you are going to want to quit. You will die a few times. Becoming a winner has everything to do with your mentality: you’ve got to picture it.’

Rien has always pictured himself ice skating at a professional level. When he was a shoe salesman, if he had a moment to himself, he would do a few hundred jumping jacks down in the storage room. ‘I did 300 jumps three times a day. Though I had to make sure I caught my breath before I returned upstairs.’ Then, after work he drove to the ice skating rink to train for a couple of hours more. In 1979 he would become the Dutch champion in marathon ice skating.

A Small Pipe from Gouda

The love for ice skating infected Rien from an early age. ‘I’ve always had a thing for ice. When it started freezing, I got anxious. I would place a cup filled with water outside to monitor the growth of ice.’

The first trip he made on skates was to Gouda. He was thirteen years old and, because no friend from school wanted to join him, he went by himself. ‘From the Kralingse Plas [a lake] in Rotterdam there’s a skating route that goes over ditches and under bridges to Gouda. Back-and-forth that’s about sixty kilometres. When you arrive in Gouda, there are stalls with waffles and they also sell small stone pipes. It was a well-known challenge to bring such a pipe back to Rotterdam in one piece.’

‘I succeeded in passing under the bridges without breaking it. Even my skate broke on the way back, but the pipe remained intact. Once in Rotterdam, I had to take the tram from the lake to my house, and it was there that a great drama then came about. As I was leaving the tram, a bunch of big dock workers were boarding. I tried my best to squeeze through, and that’s when a loud ‘snap’ sounded throughout the tram. That was my first ice skating adventure and I was unstoppable from then on. I wanted to become a professional ice skater.’

Fame and Glory for Life

Rien has brought with him a list of his 125 most memorable ice skating results. His Elfsteden crosses – the medallion competitors get after completing the 200-kilometre ride – are with him as well. Three small, bronze crosses appear from his bag. ‘It looks like nothing, really. But when you talk to an ice skater, they will all agree: all those 125 do not offset 1 Elfstedentocht. That is the tour that really matters.’

From the beginning of his career, Rien has dreamed of the Elfsteden. ‘I’d read every book there was on the tour, but we had been waiting since 1963 for it to come. The ice conditions must be perfect. Together, with other skaters, we monitored the weather closely. We had begun to doubt if we would ever get our chance when, in 1985, the good news arrived.’

On 21 February 1985, the first Elfstedentocht in 23 years was organized. The evening before, the competing skaters met in the hotel. It was nervousness all around. Team mate ‘Delirious Dries’ was the first to order an alcoholic beverage and more followed.’

‘The next morning I encountered Dries in the hallway. He looked frightened and told me to look outside. It was foggy and thawing: the worst conditions imaginable. All together we went to the cage before the start. There were 265 professional ice skaters waiting for an hour in there to start their tour. I took a good look at the faces of men as the nervousness made the colour of their faces a mixture of grey and yellow. Everyone was thinking the same thing: this has got to be their day to win the title. Winning the Elfsteden is fame and glory for the rest of your life.’

I’ll Include You in My Will

The next year they were lucky once more. ‘The tour of 1986 was completely different. Where in 1985 the ice was melting, the next year the temperature dropped to minus twenty degrees during the tour. Everyone was underdressed and freezing. Then, as by Murphy’s Law, I also lost my glove when snatching my lunch box from the organisation. My hand was going to freeze if I kept going, but a sportsman doesn’t think rationally when in a race, so I continued. I could only pray for a miracle.’

Indeed this miracle happened five kilometres later. ‘Teammate Dries had bruised his ankle and was forced to step out of the competition, but he had made it his final mission to bring me back my glove. So he came skating behind me, ignoring his pain, and threw me my glove. ‘I’ll include you in my will!’ I yelled to him.

The place that the Elfsteden holds in a sportsman’s heart cannot be understood by those who haven’t skated it, but Rien makes an attempt to explain nonetheless. ‘What makes it so special, is ice skating in pitch black, walking on skates for up to three kilometres between waters and, of course, the fact that it happens only once in a blue moon. A world champion gets to enjoy his title for a year; a winner of the Elfstedentocht for two decades. To be frank, the tour of 1985 arrived too late for me. During my better years, I’d have had a fair chance at winning the tour.’

Books

Rien documented his ice-skating experiences in two small books. Every detail is covered: highs and lows, victories and defeats – all polished off with a large dose of top sports humour. ‘I finished two of his books,’ one of the waiters shares. ‘On the beach in Malta. Women here and there, but I didn’t see them. My eyes were glued to the book.’

Rien has cut down on the ice skating. The back protests, so he prefers cycling now. But the nerves when it starts freezing, those remain.

Books by Rien de Roon (in Dutch only): ‘Het belang van borstvoeding’ en ‘Help, ik zit in het Wak’.

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By Anne Brugts, content manager Story Terrace

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This month we serve up stories in our monthly theme ‘Icy adventures’. Also read our article The Five Most Unexpected Winter Sports Locations. What’s your most adventurous story in snow and ice?