Athlete profile: Martin Hersman

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

Athlete notes

Were it not for a well-timed birthday, and a pushy parent, the people of Holland may never have come to know Martin Hersman...in 1986, Hersman turned 12 on the day of the Netherlands' famous Eleven Cities Race in which thousands of Dutch skate on the the country's frozen canals...afterwards, his father Jan, who had first taken Martin skating on the canals of Sassenheim when he was three years old, sensed his son's excitement at watching the race on television and suggested, "Why don't you try it (competing)"...Martin complied and he joined the local skating club that same evening...Jan Hersman did not stop there -- the nearest indoor ice rink was 45 minutes from their home but he made sure that Martin never missed a practice or a race..."He's a good skater and he liked to do it," says Martin of his physiotherapist father, "but when he was young, you needed a lot of money to do speed skating. So he became my biggest fan. We used to get in the car at 5:30 am because Sunday races were at 7 am"...three years later, Hersman began to compete on a regional team that included current national team members Jeroen Straathof and Gianni Romme...still on the junior team in 1994, Hersman was a surprise qualifier for Lillehammer in the 1,500m and finished eighth...he was added to the senior team the following summer and has steadily moved up the ranks in both the 1,000m and 1,500m, placing third and fourth in the two events, respectively, at last year's World Single Distance Championships...Hersman has also competed as an all-arounder and even finished sixth at the 1996 World All-Arounds..."I can do a good 5K but my 10K is not so good," he says. "In the 1,500m, I can keep the angles in my knees and I can fight the last two laps of the race"...in addition to adapting to the clap skates, which he started working with last February before his successful showing at the Single Distance championships, Hersman has worked to overcome difficulties in his skating in the corners..."I'm working on the last part of the curves to get more speed, and maintain my speed through it," he explains. "I'm improving on the curves, though"...looking toward Nagano, Hersman expects his best hopes will come in the 1,500m, rather than the shorter 1,000m race largely dominated by sprinters..."I have a better shot in the 1,500m," believes Hersman, "because most of the sprinters have better last laps in the 1,000m"...while he does, of course, hope to pan gold at the M-Wave, Hersman has no desire to turn into another Rintje Ritsma, his homeland's most famous athlete..."Everybody knows who he is," says Hersman of the 1996 World All-Around champion. "That's not my desire, to be famous, but I would want to win a gold medal in the Olympics"...Hersman's hometown of Sassenheim is in the western part of Holland, in the heart of tulip country...his mother works with autistic children -- "You know, like Rain Man," says Martin, searching for the correct term...he has a younger brother, 21, and sister, 18...he has been taking economics classes in the off-season and plans to increase his study load after the Olympics conclude...in his free time, Hersman enjoys snowboarding in France and Austria -- "There are really no big mountains in the Netherlands," he points out -- and play tennis...he used to play tennis with former teammate Bart Veldkamp, who now skates under the Belgian flag, until Bart got fed up with losing..."He can't win so he started playing golf," jokes Martin...Hersman speaks English quite well...