12 januari 2025, Rotsterhaule, The Netherlands
It is the 6th of January when I meet up with Norwegian speed skater Peder Kongshaug in his hotel room. He greets me at the door then hops back on his bike right away; there’s 30 minutes left of his indoor biking training session. We talk a bit about photography and what makes a good photo, a good photo. Of course we talk about the sport itself, his ambitions and what he hopes for the coming weekend. It’s an “easy” training session on the bike; the heavy lifting is done in the months before. It’s almost time to fight for the European Allround title.
Allround speed skating is often called the most primal form of speed skating in a competition. The first official World Championships were held in 1893 in Amsterdam and was won by Jaap Eden. It is the competition that has brought forward legends of the sport like: Ard Schenk, Johann Olav Koss and the most succesful of them all, Sven Kramer. Sven also holds the record for most allround titles ever won, with 10 European, and 9 World titles. A few things have changed throughout the years, but the constant denominator since 1893, are the 4 distances. To win the competition you have to be the fastest skater over 4 distances, combined. You start of with a 500 meter race, followed by the 5000m on the same day. The following day there are two remaining distances; the 1500 meter and the final of the four, the 10000m.
For Peder, the competition started off very well, with a second place in the 500 meter race. When i visited him in his hotel, he mentioned that he needed to skate the 500 meters in under 36 seconds to get on the podium in the end. With his 35,94 he did exactly that. Day 1 was finished with the 5000m race, on which Peder scored a 5th place with a personal best. With this peformance he stood on the top of the list after two distances. There were plenty of people around the ice rink supporting Peder and his fellow Norwegians. Sometimes i forget how loud the crowds can get.
Day two starts of with the 1500 meters. A good one for Peder, as he is in fact the reigning European champion on this distance. And this competition again, he proves to be the best in this distance. With a second, a fifth and a first place in the pocket, Peder is leading the race. However, there is one more distance to cover and that’s The hardest of them all; the 10.000m. With a gap of 5,02 seconds on his main competitor, fellow Norwegian Sander Eitrem, he knows it’s going to be a tough race. After a hard race and a thrilling competition Peder gets awarded the silver medal, and Sander wins the Allround Title. After many years, the Norwegians are back on the top step of the podium of the allround competition.
A big Thank you to Peder for allowing me to follow him during this competition and letting me into the world of a top contender for the title.
(click on the photo’s to see them in full size)