Athlete profile: Franziska Schenk

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

Athlete notes

She created Franzi-mania in Germany last year when newspapers published pictures of her in no clothes with just a shiny, silver/bronze coat of paint...at the same time, Schenk was winning the 1997 World Sprint Championships -- becoming the first woman since Bonnie Blair in 1995 to sweep the two 500s and two 1,000s...in Nagano, Schenk's Olympics -- if not her body -- could be painted in gold...the bronze medalist in the 500 meters in Lillehammer and a fourth-place finisher in the 1,000, Schenk has seen her North American rivals change from Blair to American Chris Witty and Canadian Catriona LeMay-Doan...in November 1997 in Calgary, all three skaters broke the magical 1:16 barrier as Witty set a world record in the 1,000...Schenk was unfazed as LeMay-Doan also scorched the world record in the 500..."It was not only a question of clap skates, it was a question of really super fast ice at Calgary and I think I never experienced faster ice," she says. "I am not expecting that fast ice at the Olympics. But LeMay would not be my biggest competitor if there were not clap skates. Because I am now used to the saktes, I think I have a real chance to beat her"...but a world record is not foremost in Franziska's mind..."I'm not really concentrating on world records because that would be really unfair to the old records or the former world record holders because it is something completely different," she says. "What I am focused on are the Olympic Games. I want to win another medal there"...Schenk has followed two other former East German athletes, figure skater Katarina Witt and swimmer Franziska van Almsick as sport/sex symbols in Germany...indeed, the woman from Erfurt has made a hugely successful transition to the West...she speaks engaging English and is media savvy...after winning the World Sprints, she regaled the world's media with the story of how the night before the first day of competition she was so worked up that she waltzed around restlessly in bed thinking about what could happen...and the media responded with more queries about a possible modeling career than her skating...one German newspaper calls her "charm on the rocks"...while Schenk's charm is genuine, she has also been very calculating, in what German media calls a "media offensive"...she majors in German film at a University in Mainz, Germany...she has expressly stated her intentions of becoming a television journalist, has completed three interships -- the latest last spring for a children's production on one of Germany's main television networks, ZDF..."I met a lot of journalist so far and it is really interesting to talk about their work and gives you maybe a different point of view than you may have had before," says Schenk. "It gives you more of an understanding for their work and sometimes I have more understanding for my training as well"...she is managed by Johannes Kessler, a somewhat acerbic manager in a Mainz public relations agency..."Naturally, we have thought out what she should say in a short amount of time," says Kessler. "In a half a minute you can ruin a lot"...it was Kessler and Schenk who released the controversial pictures to spotlight the World Sprints..."I want to tell you, you don't feel naked anymore when you have color on your skin because you don't see the skin color anymore," Schenk said. "I was really surprised by the result and this picture is one of my favorites. I really like it a lot"...as a result, Schenk has gained the attention of a shoe company, a clothes retailer, and Kessler got a commercial with a giant mail order company in Germany...during the early winter, Schenk went to Alaska to film a commercial in which she races a polar bear...she often trains in the weight room of the University -- although she took the year off to concentrate on the Olympics...Franziska's mother is a former teacher, and Franziska says she'll return to school after the Olympics...the name Schenk is already famous in speed skating lore -- Dutchman Ard Schenk won three gold medals at the 1972 Sapporo Olympics, the last time the Games were in Japan..."We are not related," says Franziska. "Hopefully, I can make the name Schenk as famous for my family as he did for his"...growing up in Erfurt, a small, picturesque city in eastern Germany, Schenk's parents took her to frozen lakes outside the city...in third grade, she took ice skating as part of her physical education requirement in school...teachers directed her into speed skating at age 11 and she enrolled in the Erfurt program that has produced five-time medalist Gunda Niemann (now Niemann-Stirnemann)and eight-time Olympic medalist Karin Kania (KAHN-yah)...out of the 30 skaters who started with Franziska, only Franziska made it to the international level...Schenk enjoys riding motorcycles in her free time...her father is a foreman in a factory...