The winner in 1940 and 1941: Auke Adema
Auke Adema was born in 1907 in Franeker, one of the 11 cities of the tour. His family was very poor, his father being a ragman. In 1933 an Elfstedentocht was organized where he could have participated. He was then 26 years old. He did not participate. In these crisis years he was without work and the family did not have enough money for such an event. Later he got a job as workman for a wholesale dealer in fertilizers. His task was the carry bags of 75 kilos on his back from the boats in the harbor of Franeker, down the stairs of the boats and 70 meters further on the wall to the place where they were processed further. This he had to do during 8 hours each day for 6 days a week what was a normal working week at that time. It will be clear that he was a very strong person. This has been illustrated by Lolkama (2006 pp 121) by a story.
"He once visited an attraction park where somebody offered 25 guilders to the person who could keep a halter for more than 30 seconds above his head. For a work man like Adema 25 guilders was equal to a week´s salary. Adema accepted the bet, easily lifted the very heavy halter and kept it above his head a long time. The manager of the event was very surprised. He told that in seven years nobody had been able to do this. Adema told him that he could have done it as well if the halter would have been twice as heavy."
So due to his work he must have been very strong but that was not all. Next to the heavy work, he was also very interested in participating in sports. He participated in cycling, especially long distances and of course in skating if that was possible.
Now back to the “elfstedentocht”. The second opportunity he got to participate in this tour was in 1940. He not only participated but also won with 4 other people the race. This was one of the hardest tours that had been organized, comparable with the tour in 1963. The 5 winners of the tour worked strongly together to bring the tour to a good end in the cold, the wind and the problems of the snow on the ice. Given the amount of effort they did together, they decided to finish together and not to make a race between them. They were together recognized by the “Elfsteden” committee as the winners of the tour of 1940.
"He once visited an attraction park where somebody offered 25 guilders to the person who could keep a halter for more than 30 seconds above his head. For a work man like Adema 25 guilders was equal to a week´s salary. Adema accepted the bet, easily lifted the very heavy halter and kept it above his head a long time. The manager of the event was very surprised. He told that in seven years nobody had been able to do this. Adema told him that he could have done it as well if the halter would have been twice as heavy."
So due to his work he must have been very strong but that was not all. Next to the heavy work, he was also very interested in participating in sports. He participated in cycling, especially long distances and of course in skating if that was possible.
Now back to the “elfstedentocht”. The second opportunity he got to participate in this tour was in 1940. He not only participated but also won with 4 other people the race. This was one of the hardest tours that had been organized, comparable with the tour in 1963. The 5 winners of the tour worked strongly together to bring the tour to a good end in the cold, the wind and the problems of the snow on the ice. Given the amount of effort they did together, they decided to finish together and not to make a race between them. They were together recognized by the “Elfsteden” committee as the winners of the tour of 1940.
Later that year the country was occupied by the Germans but the following year, when it was freezing again, the “Elfstedentocht” was organized anyway and this time the weather and the ice were much better and so there were even more participants in the race then the year before. The winning time was 2 hours less than the year before but now Auke Adema won alone, leaving his followers behind him in the last part of the race. Recently a video of this race has been found in the USA which indicates not only how Auke Adema won the race but also the way he and some people in the first group skated in that time.
Especially Auke Adema has a very wild style of skating, moving his legs very high and very far behind his back. Often he is moving so wild that I was afraid (and in fact he too) that he would lose his balance. Besides that he is skating very much on the inside of his skates. This combination is so far from how people now learn to skate nowadays that I thought the first time that I saw this, that a person with such a style could not finish the tour at all. Later I realized that he was the winner. He must have been so strong, as I described above, that he not only finished the race but also became the winner or this race.
In the video presented below you see Auke Adema skating in the different parts of the route. Most of the time he is in the front of the other skaters or alone. If he is in a group you can always recognize him given my description of his style of skating. Note also that they sometimes have to walk to a control post in order to get a stamp of the town which they passed. I hope that you also see that these eleven cities are very nice.
Especially Auke Adema has a very wild style of skating, moving his legs very high and very far behind his back. Often he is moving so wild that I was afraid (and in fact he too) that he would lose his balance. Besides that he is skating very much on the inside of his skates. This combination is so far from how people now learn to skate nowadays that I thought the first time that I saw this, that a person with such a style could not finish the tour at all. Later I realized that he was the winner. He must have been so strong, as I described above, that he not only finished the race but also became the winner or this race.
In the video presented below you see Auke Adema skating in the different parts of the route. Most of the time he is in the front of the other skaters or alone. If he is in a group you can always recognize him given my description of his style of skating. Note also that they sometimes have to walk to a control post in order to get a stamp of the town which they passed. I hope that you also see that these eleven cities are very nice.
With all his strength he was able to skate the 200km faster than all others in a time of 9 hours and 37 minutes or an average speed of 21 km per hour.
In the next section I will illustrate the present skating style of the winner of 1985 and 1986 and you will see that the style of him and the other skaters is very different which is certainly one of the explanations for the difference in speed through time.
In the next section I will illustrate the present skating style of the winner of 1985 and 1986 and you will see that the style of him and the other skaters is very different which is certainly one of the explanations for the difference in speed through time.