Athlete profile: Neal Marshall

Posted: Tue February 3, 1998 at 5:00 PM ET

Athlete notes

Last summer, he had the Marshall Plan - to challenge the Dutch, the land of his forefathers...in his last race of the 1997 season on the Calgary Olympic Oval, Marshall shattered his personal record in setting the 1,500-meter world record...but with everyone now accustomed to the clap skates, Marshall has been curiously left behind..."I'm not panicking yet, I've got time to pick it up before Nagano," Marshall said in December. "It's been little things with my technique, little things that cost you speed early on and sap your energy for late in the race"...Marshall had only been on clap skates three weeks before setting his 1,500m world record..."The thing is, I know I can do even better on them," Marshall says. "I had the basics down, but I'm still getting used to starting on them because the level of stability is not the same. It takes a lot to get used to make a full effort on the skates. Maybe this slump is my two steps back before the great leap forward. But I can't wait to see what my times are like when I really get used to having them on"...his mother, Ann, is a homemaker who coached all her boys in speed skating from an early age..."Mom's from Holland and she introduced all of us to the sport," Marshall says. "She was my coach for many years, up until I made the national team"...his great-grandfather, Klaas Hanje, was a Dutch speed skating champion and uncle Joe Hanje was also a member of the Canadian national team..."I guess speed skating is in my blood," Neal says....if clap skates stirred Marshall's speed skating engine, he needs no coaxing with motorcycle engines...fixing and riding old motorcycles is Marshall's form of therapy and relaxation..."I'm actually in a garage working on a bike as I'm talking now," says Marshall. "It's an old Suzuki I bought as a wreck. I'm restoring it with a new engine. When I work on a bike, it complements my skating as well as offering a getaway from the ice. Motorcycles are complex and difficult to fix, so I have to concentrate just like I do on the ice"...his love of motorcycles is evident as he says, "I kind of feel that when I make my bike better, I make myself better"...another hobby of Marshall's is music...he plays in a band with other current and former speed skaters..."We only get together about once a month, not even enough to have a name yet. I play the drums," he says. "I love playing Pearl Jam and songs by The Police, but some songs I sing while my brother plays the drums"...younger brother and part-time drummer Kevin is also a member of the Canadian team...older brothers Steve and Mike are former speed skaters; Mike now coaches the Canadian women's national team...when asked how it was growing up with brothers who competed in the same sport, Neal responds, "We were competitive, but not to a bad degree. They helped make me what I am today"...Neal's father, Alan, works for British Columbia Telephone... Marshall's girlfriend is fellow speed skater and Canadian team member Susan Auch...Neal is helping Susan refurbish a house in her hometown of Calgary...Marshall feels that one of his biggest assets is his ability to focus in the moments before the race begins..."It's the calmest point of the whole competition for me," he says. "I'm thinking about my pacing in the race, technique going into the curves. I don't really hear anything, it's like there's no one there but me. When I take the starting position, that's when the nerves hit a little and the environment comes back into play. By focusing the way I do, though, my goal is to turn that nervous energy into race energy. Nerves transform into adrenaline"...when he talks about Nagano, Marshall sounds as if he's going to burst with anticipation..."When I'm riding my bike, I tend to daydream about skating the perfect race there," he says. "I'm looking forward to being ecstatic when I finish the 1,500m in Nagano. The whole world won't stop if I don't win; but, man, I get emotional just thinking about winning"...