Marching on from RTC into NTT!

I was overjoyed when I heard that I was allowed to sign a topsport contract with the Regional Training Center in Almere in the fall of 2020. The contract allowed me to join Robbert-Jan van Velzen's windfoil team, and I started participating twice a week on Saturday and Sunday. Robbert-Jan as an experienced trainer offered me the space to develop myself. With video-analysis and technical conversations on the shore, and of course the feedback from my new teammates, I managed to reach a steep learning curve.

In August '20 I had been on the foil for the first time and in the summer of '21 there would be my very first legitimate competition: the World Cup on Lake Garda, Italy. It was a sort of baptism of fire! Together with the Regional Training Center team that meanwhile had became a very close group of friends, we had the opportunity to show our qualities. Everything we had been training on for the past six months had to come out now. But when I look back at that World Championship, I was missing one very important thing: experience. Experience is not something you can train. Experience is what you gain by sailing a lot of races and being on the water for many hours. My skills were on a good level, but I let myself be overwhelmed by the fast-looking opponents.

Due to stupid mistakes in the beginning of the racing week, I dropped down on the ranking towards the silver fleet. But eventually ending up in the silver fleet, I did sail decent results and I entered the top of the ranking. As an athlete, the silver fleet is of course not nearly enough, but looking back it was the highest achievable for me at the time. Luckily the results that I'd sailed at the World Cup ultimately won me a place in the National Talent Team. I would like to thank Robbert-Jan van Velzen and the entire RTC team. These people made it possible for me to become a competitive windfoiler in such a short time span. Let's see what my time at the NTT squad will bring me . But since a number of friends from the previous team will also flow through, it should absolutely be a super fun and educational time! 

Thank you for reading! 

Regards, Freerk.