Fitting Christmas into training

Tufte, off the water but still training
© Dominik Keller

There is a reason why Norway’s Olaf Tufte is currently the fastest man in the world. Tufte, the infallible workhorse, does not know the meaning of time out from training and no Christmas Day celebration is going to change that.

When most people are enjoying food and gifts, Tufte is sticking to his training regime. “I go to the club, and train all day long. Come home one hour before dinner. Have a shower and watch cartoons with my father,” says Tufte. “I do what is on my programme for that day. And some?”

Meanwhile across the globe and heading into summer Australia’s three time Olympic Champion James Tomkins will be far away from the calls of his training programme and focusing solely on eating and drinking. “The only activity that I will be undertaking,” says Tomkins, “is lots of surfing and building sand castles.”

Germany’s training machine is back in business with the men’s sweep and women’s sculling squad heading to the altitude resort of St. Moritz in Switzerland two days after Christmas. Cross-country skiing will be de rigueur for the first camp of the 2005 season. The women’s sweep team will also be on skis when they come together in Silvaplana, Switzerland for a two-week camp.

Stroke of the Athens gold medal men’s eight, Bryan Volpenhein of the United States, will also be taking to the ski slopes along with several other members of his Olympic crew, including coxswain Pete Cipollone. The mountains of California will be their cross training. “I’m not sure if downhill skiing, wine and good food can be considered cross training,” says Volpenhein. “I call it holiday cheer.”

Niksa Skelin’s silver medal in the pair at Athens was the outcome of a three-year build-up with older brother Sinisa. Niksa said that after the Olympics they got the chance to come back to “normal life,” but workouts have since resumed. The brothers continue to train with the same motivation that took them to Athens although the focus is different. “I’m going to Slovenia to do some alpine and cross-country skiing with Iztok Cop,” says Niksa who will return to his hometown, Split, to continue training with Sinisa on New Year’s Eve.

Many of China’s top rowers have headed south to the warmer climes of Guangzhou and Thousand Island Lake in southeast China. Christmas Day is a regular training day and no holiday break will be coming their way until the Chinese spring festival in February next year. The spring festival, or Chinese New Year, is celebrated by the entire squad and some will have up to two weeks rest at this time depending on their schedule.

Marit van Eupen of the Dutch bronze medal Olympic lightweight double rounded out her pre-Christmas training by winning the elite lightweight class at the Euro Open indoor rowing competition. Van Eupen has added plenty of variety to her post-Olympic training rowing in a variety of boats and events. After competing in the Euro Open van Eupen joined second place getter, Denmark’s Juliane Rasmussen, in a quad. In October van Eupen raced in her club’s eight at the Head of the Charles at Boston in the United States. There she added a gold medal to her collection.

Van Eupen will be back in regular training the day after Christmas with a one-week focus on technique in team boats. “But,” she says, “It depends on an ice-free Bosbaan. Otherwise we will be focusing on our skating technique.”

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