Orie after good qualifying tournament for Team Essent: ‘We intervened hard’

An unexpected boost for Jac Orie and his ‘new’ Essent team. After a bad season, then under the name Jumbo-Visma, the World Cup qualifying competition went better than the coach expected.

“It’s going well, isn’t it,” Orie feels relieved afterwards.

The Essent pink team picked up fifteen tickets for the next four World Cup weekends. New signings such as Suzanne Schulting and Angel Daleman dominated the shorter distances. Joep Wennemars, who missed out on the tickets last year, has now qualified for both the 1,000 and 1,500 metres.

And so Orie can rightly say it went well. “I’m very happy with that. We were hoping for these results after making all kinds of difficult decisions in March.”

The trainer did not fully expect the level to be already high. “Sometimes things happen faster than you think, apparently. “

The difference from a year ago, when the team was still black and yellow and called Jumbo-Visma, is big. At the time, World Cup qualification was amazing. Orie’s team went from 22 tickets to 12 tickets. Reggeborgh Team did better with 16 pieces.

It was the start of a mediocre season for Orie and his team. The exodus that followed was enormous. Dai Dai N’tab (to IKO-X2O), Thomas Krol (retired), Kai Verbij (no new team), Jorrit Bergsma (back to AH-Zaanlander), Jutta Leerdam (own team) and Antoinette Rijpma-De Jong (to Reggeborgh) the previously successful Orie team.

New names have been added. Think of Sanne in ‘t Hof and Isabel Grevelt, but short distance skaters Schulting and the very young Daleman also got a place in the team.

Nevertheless, technical director Sven Kramer said before the opening of the skating season: “We have consciously chosen to take a step back, give it time and grow. That might not pay off yet, but it definitely will. Pay off.”

This winter seems brighter. Among the men, Tijmen Snel won the 1,500 meters and Chris Huizinga the five and ten kilometers. Merijn Scheperkamp,​​​​ Wennemars and Freek van der Ham also won starting places.

No distance was won in the women’s race, but Schulting, Daleman and In ‘t Hof took tickets at several distances. A total of fifteen tickets were won. Not as much as a few years ago, but probably better than expected.

Reggeborgh took thirteen tickets provisionally, AH-Zaanlander eight and Team IKO-X2O three.

So what has changed in one summer? Orie: “The mood is positive and that’s contagious.”

“Last year there was a different atmosphere and I felt that it needed to be improved, with a different approach. The team was also too big. We intervened hard on that, which was not fun.”

Having too many skaters on the way out on the team would be a problem. The proportions had become tight, Orie thinks. “What always happens in skating teams: there are people who stop,” says the coach.

“Sometimes one thing reinforces the other. It’s about these ‘interactions’,” as Orie calls it. “That includes these things.”