Women in the “Elfstedentocht”
It is hard to believe but on January 1 and 2 in 1805 a championship in speed skating for women over a short distance was organized in Leeuwarden (Friesland) where 126 women participated and where both days 15.000 spectators were present. Such championships have been organized during the 19th and the 20th century. Some people earned quite some money in these championships. I will report about these championships later but I mention it here to indicate that participation of women in races was not unusual.
In the ”Elfstedentocht” the women were not allowed to participate in the race till 1985. There was a general opinion that women did not have the capacity for long distances. For example after the Olympic Games in 1928 the 800m for women in atlethics was removed from the program because people decided that it was too long a distance for women. The 800m for women did not come back in the program of the Olympic Games till 1968. For more details about this discussion I like to refer to the nice book of Mark Hilberts: Deelnemen mag … winnen is een ander verhaal (2014). This does not mean that women were not participating in an extreme long distance sport like the Elfstedentocht. I will illustrate this by several examples.
An Elfstedentocht in1890
Lysbeth Hoekstra-Seitsma skated in 1890 the 200 km of the Elfstedentocht together with her sister Akke and their both husbands Hessel Hoekstra and Klaas Reitsma. They finished the tour around the eleven cities in 14 hours and 30 minuites. When Lysbeth made the tour she was 30 years old and had given birth to one son and two daughters. Akke Seitsma was 21 years old when she made the tour. They were the first two women of whom it is known that they finished this extreme long skating tour. This was before the Elfstedentocht officially was organized.
The Elfstedentocht in 1912
Jikke Gaastra was the first women that started in the officially organized “Elfstedentocht” . It was in the year 1912. She skated the tour together with her brother Jelle. The ice in that tour got worse and worse. When they arrived at the before last city they were informed that they were not allowed to go on because the ice was too bad. The tour was cancelled because a participant, G Dubois, went through the ice close to the "ice-in" Dille before Leeuwarden. Because the ”Elfsteden” commission believed that they would have been able to finish the tour, they received the medal for their tour. In this way she was the first woman to received the Elfstedentocht medal.
The Elfstedentocht in 1917
Janna van der Weg started in the “Elfstedentocht” of 1917 together with her husband Jan. That year 5 more women started in the tour of which 4 reached the finish. Janna van der Weg was the first of the women. They started in Leeuwarden around 5.30 and arrived again in Leeuwarden at 18.47 which means that they needed 13hours and 15 minutes for the tour. This is one hour and 15 minutes less that the group of Lysbeth Houkstra-Stienstra in 1890.
In 1929 there were 5 women that started the tour but none of them finished it on time. In 1933 there were 12 female participants of which 11 finished in time and the first was Els de Nekker but about her I could not find any information. After that the period of Sjoerdsje Faber and Wobkje Kooistra started. Both came from the same village Warga in Friesland.
In 1929 there were 5 women that started the tour but none of them finished it on time. In 1933 there were 12 female participants of which 11 finished in time and the first was Els de Nekker but about her I could not find any information. After that the period of Sjoerdsje Faber and Wobkje Kooistra started. Both came from the same village Warga in Friesland.
The Elfstedentocht in 1940
Sjoerdsje Faber was in the very difficult “elfstedentocht” in 1940 the only woman who finished the tour in time of a group of 35 women who started. At that moment she was 23 years old. She skated the tour with two men, the father of Wobkje Kooistra and her brother. The organization of the Elfstedentocht was rather impressed by her result and therefore invited her for the official celebration of the winners of the tour although she did not participate in the race. The story goes that she was fit enough after this tour to party till 3 in the morning and went at 7 again to her work. Her success also got a lot of attention in the newspapers and she was invited for presentations to tell about her experiences.
The Elfstedentocht in 1941
In 1941 there was again an “Elfstedentocht” and now father Kooistra choose for support of his own daughter Wobkje who was then 16 years old. It turned out to become a real race between the two women where one had the support of her family and the other not. In the end Wobkje arrived in Leeuwarden before Sjoerdsje. This was the first time that there was a kind of race between women in the elfstedentocht. However that did not prevent that they were friends and that they started to participate in speed skating races together, especially the long distances. They saw sport as a nice activity next to the hard work they had to do in the farm. Wobkje tells about it for example: “After this tour I ate a bit and went to bed immediately because at 4 a.m. I had to get up to help in the farm.”
The Elfstedentocht in 1942
In this foto we see the surprising first arriving woman Antje Schaap in the Elfstedentocht of 1942 with the chairman (Hepkema) of the Vereniging de Friesche Elfsteden. This was a very easy tour where 167 women started and 153 finished in time but Antje Schaap (21 years young) was the first. She finished after 9 hours and 36 minutes which was a very good time. Little is known about her background. She told to a newspaper that she skated together with her two brothers and that she expected to be the first woman when she saw Sjoerdsje Faber and Wobkje Kooistra going to Dokum while she was already had passed Dokum and was on her way to Leeuwarden. She also told that she had only made one tour that year and normally did gymnastics.
The Elfstedentocht in 1947
In the tour of 1942 Wobkle Kooistra and Sjoerdsje Faber had made an agreement not to skate against each other but to skate together. It was a very nice day and they enjoyed it a lot skating together.
n 1947 was the next Elfstedentocht. This time they asked the “Vereniging de Friesche Elfsteden” to participate in the race but that was immediately refused on the basis of the rules of the “Elfstedentocht” which did not allow women to participate in the race. The ice was rather good this time but there was a strong wind and at several places there were snow dunes on the ice so it was a rather hard tour. They were 23 and 30 years old at that time and well trained therefore they could finish the tour in time. The last part they had to skate in the dark from Dokkum to Leeuwarden with wind in the back. There they fell several times very hard on the ice. Around 9 in the night they arrived together as the first women in Leeuwarden. There were only a few people of the organization to meet them. It was a big mess because there were accusations about not allowed behavior (opleggen) of the male winner of the tour ( Joop Bosman) and the second (Klaas Schipper). So there was little attention anymore for the other skaters not even for the first arriving women. There also were no invitation for them in the festivities. They made the feast at home because they were very proud that they had finished this difficult tour.
n 1947 was the next Elfstedentocht. This time they asked the “Vereniging de Friesche Elfsteden” to participate in the race but that was immediately refused on the basis of the rules of the “Elfstedentocht” which did not allow women to participate in the race. The ice was rather good this time but there was a strong wind and at several places there were snow dunes on the ice so it was a rather hard tour. They were 23 and 30 years old at that time and well trained therefore they could finish the tour in time. The last part they had to skate in the dark from Dokkum to Leeuwarden with wind in the back. There they fell several times very hard on the ice. Around 9 in the night they arrived together as the first women in Leeuwarden. There were only a few people of the organization to meet them. It was a big mess because there were accusations about not allowed behavior (opleggen) of the male winner of the tour ( Joop Bosman) and the second (Klaas Schipper). So there was little attention anymore for the other skaters not even for the first arriving women. There also were no invitation for them in the festivities. They made the feast at home because they were very proud that they had finished this difficult tour.
The Elfstedentocht in 1947
It may look as if Sjoerdske and Wobke were the only fanatic skaters in the country. They were at least the most known at that time but there was another woman that could compete with them skating long distance tours. That was Deborah van der Hoorn, the sister of the winner of the “Elfstedentocht” of 1947. She had beaten Sjoerdske and Wobke in a real race in Loosdrecht. Huup Snoep in his website (www.schaatsen.nl/schaatsverhalen/deborah-van-der-hoorn-pionier-op-het-ijs) tells some interesting details about this skate fan which was probably illustrative for the women skating in general in that period. He tells. “ She skated in a short skirt with underneath stockings of wool. She did not had long trousers at that time. She had not prepared herself especially for this race. She lived along a lake and skated whenever it was possible, That is what her family did. Her father was a good skater and her brothers as well. “
Of course she also wanted to go to the “Elfstedentocht” of 1947 but there was no place in the car that brought her father and her brother to Leeuwarden. Fortunately somebody else offered a place in his car but they ended in a snow storm during the night and were the whole night on the way to Leeuwarden where they arrived 5minutes before 5 o´clock , 5 minutes before the registration was closed. So without sleep she started the tour which was very demanding. For this reason she could also not compete with the two Frisian women that arrived first. I would like to add one funny story that Huuo Snoep tells of her tour. “Close to Harlingen the ice was very bad and there was a lot of sand on the ice. Due to that my skates became very blunt. To go on I put my wooden skates under my feet in the opposite direction. In this way I had again sharp skates.” In 1947 only 6 women of the 35 that started arrived at time. Deborah van der Hoorn was one of them.
"After that year I did not skate so much anymore. I married and got children and then skating is over, so it was in that period" she said. However this is not in general true as we have seen.
Of course she also wanted to go to the “Elfstedentocht” of 1947 but there was no place in the car that brought her father and her brother to Leeuwarden. Fortunately somebody else offered a place in his car but they ended in a snow storm during the night and were the whole night on the way to Leeuwarden where they arrived 5minutes before 5 o´clock , 5 minutes before the registration was closed. So without sleep she started the tour which was very demanding. For this reason she could also not compete with the two Frisian women that arrived first. I would like to add one funny story that Huuo Snoep tells of her tour. “Close to Harlingen the ice was very bad and there was a lot of sand on the ice. Due to that my skates became very blunt. To go on I put my wooden skates under my feet in the opposite direction. In this way I had again sharp skates.” In 1947 only 6 women of the 35 that started arrived at time. Deborah van der Hoorn was one of them.
"After that year I did not skate so much anymore. I married and got children and then skating is over, so it was in that period" she said. However this is not in general true as we have seen.
Women in the Elfsteden race
Strangely enough there was quite some attention for the women that participated in the “Elfstedentocht” in the begin period till 1950 but about the participants in 1954 and 1956 we only know the names but not much more.160 women started in the most demanding Elfstedentocht ever (1963) but none of them finished the tour. Nevertheless this event was a critical event in the development of speed skating not only for men but also for women. All skaters were looking for a repetition of this event and were training for it. But the event did not occur. After 10 years people had enough of waiting and the Dutch Skatimg Union started to organize what was called “marathon skating” on the artificial ice track in Amsterdam. It was a weekly championship over minimal 25 rounds and maximally 250 rounds on a 400 meters artificial skating track. The women were normally skating 25 rounds which for many was too short a distance. When these races became a success and got attention on the TV (semi) professional marathon teams were created sponsored by commercial companies. In 1974 the first “Alternatieve Elfstedentocht”, also a tour of 200km was organized in Norway. This competition was then repeated nearly every year in different places in the world. There was especially one woman, Lenie van der Hoorn, who by her successful participation in these activities promoted speed skating over long distances for woman. Given the success of the long distance skating competitions for women the committee of the the “Elstedentocht” could not continue to forbid the participation on women in the speed skating race of the “Elfstedentocht. So before the next Elfstedentocht was held the rules of the race were changed in the sense that men as well as women could participate in the race. The first race where women were aloowed toe participate was in 1985.
The Elfstedentocht in 1985
After all the “alternative Elfstedentochten” and other 200km races she had already won, she was definitely one of the possible candidates to win this edition of the Elfstedentocht. Her disadvantage was that she had waited long for this opportunity, being now 37 years old, and the fact that she was not a member of a sponsored marathon team. The latter was a problem because for this reason she had problems to get the necessary food and drinks during the race. Nevertheless she won the race because as she said herself “she was rather good in “klunen” (walking on skates) and she could during a whole day skating close to her maximum without breaking down”. The last 5 kilometers she skated with her hands free but there are no fotos or videos made of her arrival. The woman race was still seen as irrelevant compared with the men´s race. There was even no prize prepared for the female winner. At the last moment they gave her the M.H.Geertsprize but that one she had to return later. The public understood the situation better and song “ Lenie won the World Cup”. In general she is a bit bitter about the way she has been treated even though her result was impressive. She finished in 7 hours and 33 minutes faster than all male winners in the races before 1985.
The Elfstedentocht in 1986
Tineke Dijkshoorn describes herself more as an inline skater than a skater on ice . One time she became also champion of the Netherland in inline skates.She trained a lot in the summer and the winter. On the artifical ice track in The Hague she learned how to skate curves. In 1979 she was good enough to enter the national marathon competition although the 25 rounds (10km) was too short for her. In 1984 she skated her first 200 km race in Canada where she became third. That inspired her to participate also in the Elfstedentocht of 1985. There she became the 5th. In 1986 she did not participate in the marathon competition because of her work but when the Elfstedentocht was announced she started immediately to train again. About the race itself she does not say much except that she had a super day. Her children were looking at the TV with their class but they saw very little of the first woman in the race. In Dokkum Betty Westerveld skated close behind her. Therefore, she tried to skate the last part as fast as possible and finished the tour as winnner but completely exhausted. The organization did not pay any special attention to her as winner of the female race. Later she and her husband went by themselves to the Friesland hall for the awards ceremony but it was so crowded and the public there were so drunk that they did not like to go through this crowd in the hall. So they went home where people had prepared a big feast for her.
The Elfstedentocht in 1997
After the Elfstedentocht of 1986 the people had to wait 11 years before the next tour was held. But they spend the time well. There were more and more female participants in the marathon races and the 200km races held in different countries in the world. So there was now a rather large qualified crowd of very good female skaters. Klasina Seinstra estaba a dedicated participant of this group. In 1996 she won the "alternatieve Elfstedentocht" at the Weissensee in Austria and in 1997 she became National marathon champion on artificial ice. But she lost just before the Elfstedentocht the Dutch championship on natural ice. She was beaten in the sprint by one of the two skating stars of the family Smit (Janita) who did not much work in the tour itself but won the sprint. So Klasina Seinstra swore to herself that this would not happen again in the Elfstedentocht. This race started very bad for her. In the dark during the first 50 kilometers she fell very hard together with a large group of other skaters. Fortunately she could continue and at the last kilometers there was again only one competitor left, the other sister of the Smit family (Greta) who tried to get away from her because she was not very good in the sprint but Klasina stayed close to her and in the final meters she beat her and so she became the winner in a very nice time of 7 hours and 49 minutes.
Also in this case there was little attention of the organization for the female winner. The worst was that in the award ceremony there was a wreath for the male winner, Henk Angenent, but not for her. This was solved by Henk Angenent by inviting her in his wreath. She did not care about this, she enjoyed tremendously that she realized this succes.
Also in this case there was little attention of the organization for the female winner. The worst was that in the award ceremony there was a wreath for the male winner, Henk Angenent, but not for her. This was solved by Henk Angenent by inviting her in his wreath. She did not care about this, she enjoyed tremendously that she realized this succes.
Final comment
also In this overview we have seen that the organization of the Elfstedentocht learned only very slowly that their extremely long skating tour is also an event where women can play a role. Probably the next time they will organize a separate race for the women so that they don´t have to skate at the same time as the male participants. The advantage is that the participants know better what their position is in the match. So far this was a problem. The organization will probably next time also pay equal attention to the race of the women as to the men because they deserve it as can be seen in the underneath presented table where we see how much progress has been made by the women.
In a later part of this website I will show that the fastest time for women over 200km is nowadays very close to the record for the men. This is maybe an even more unexpected result which requires to be taken into account.