Velzeboer puts textbooks aside to beat Schulting: ‘It’s in it’

Last season, short track star Xandra Velzeboer improved the world record in the 500 meters, won three World Cup competitions and won three Dutch titles. Yet that is not the only thing that the 21-year-old Velzeboer, who lives in Heerenveen, is busy with.

Like many of her peers, she is pursuing a university degree. When Velzeboer is not busy driving laps on the ice rink, she immerses herself in the world of Life Science and Technology. “A biology study”, explains Velzeboer in simpler terms. “For example, you learn how diseases arise and about vaccines.”

Last year, the year of the Olympic Games, she put her textbooks aside for a while, but after Tokyo, where she won gold with the relay team, she resumed her studies. “Still on a low ebb, though,” says Velzeboer.

“I’m away a lot in a year anyway, so planning exams is sometimes difficult. And I also have to be in the lab sometimes. That’s not always handy with the training schedule. I try to do it on the side, but it not going fast.”

The daughter of former short track speed skater Mark Velzeboer, who took part in the 1992 Games, is now about a third of her studies and is determined to finish it. “I chose this because I find it interesting and not because it is easy to combine with skating. Then I would have chosen something else.”

“I think it would be very nice to really do something else after skating,” Velzeboer continues. “But that’s how I look at it now. Maybe later I’ll think: I absolutely love it and I want to stay in the sport.”

“I don’t know yet and that’s why I’d like to keep the option open, so that I have the choice. So I hope to complete the study one day, but when that will happen, I don’t know yet.”

In any case, Velzeboer does not have her nose in the books during tournaments. “In any case, you are busy for three days. If you don’t have to do resit rounds, you can often sleep in in the morning, but you also need that to recharge for the day. And mentally you want to skating, not doing anything else.”

Her status in the short track world has changed considerably in a short time, she has noticed. “If you just came to watch the World Cup circuit, the opponents do not estimate you as the strongest opponent. I think that has changed by now.”

“Now they know that they have to take me into account,” said Velzeboer, who therefore does not feel any extra pressure. “I also expect myself to drive and win finals. Ultimately, I want to drive and perform well for myself.”

“Of course I feel that more is expected of me now, because I have done well this season,” she continues. “So then you are expected to do that again, but I don’t really see that as a burden.”

Suzanne Schulting, for many years the leader of the Dutch short track team, feels Velzeboer’s hot breath on her neck. At the World Cup competitions in Dresden, Velzeboer was close behind Schulting, but she was a few centimeters short of gold.

“It’s in there”, Velzeboer answers when asked whether she can beat Schulting at the last World Cup of the season, this weekend in Dordrecht, or the World Cup in South Korea in mid-March.

“At the moment I just have a lot of speed. I’ve become faster again this year than last year. And I think I’m driving with guts, that I can race well and react to things that happen during the race,” she says. her strength on the ice rink. “And I ride with confidence.”

At the only tournament in his own country this season, the World Cup final in Dordrecht, Velzeboer hopes to achieve good performances. “It’s just super cool to skate a competition in front of the home crowd,” she says with a big smile on her face.

“So I definitely want to perform there and make it a great party.”