Since the spring of 2018, Tjas offers the possibility to work on developing their sports abilities over several years. Since fanatical athletes can motivate each other, a team has been made especially for this: the educational team. Skaters with a sufficient level to take on physical taxation, can join the educational team. For top athletes, the Educational Team functions as a stepping stone to or a safety net for regional selections or commercial team. During the winter season, this group receives extra support off-ice, such as food, logs and training schedules. Since the individual differences in level are smaller during the summer, during the season this group trains together at Tjas training moments as much as possible, and sometimes even at other times. Under the header “Extensive activities Tjas Educational Team” you can read more about what to expect as a member of this team.
At the moment, the Educational Team consists of over ten skaters, both racers and marathon riders. In consultation, it’s also possible to join the team as a competitive cyclist. Are you interested in becoming a member of the team, or would you like more information? Just send an email to . After the KEI-week you’ll be able to join the Educational Team again.
Team members pay a fee of about €100 for the extra support and the clinics you can take over the year.
Extensive activities Tjas Educational Team
- Schedule for 6-8 times a week: of course there is room for build-up for those who can’t start with this, and have to train to get there first consultation and tweaking of schedule per person + trainer who is available for consultation. Annual schedule with various accents (duration, speed, technique etc.), so that the training offers variation and participants can learn a lot.
- Summer: three standard Tjas training sessions a week + 1 supervised training per week, exclusively for the educational team, and a few unsupervised training sessions (such as cycling training).
- Winter: training in the various speeder groups, with extra personal guidance. Furthermore, there are still supervised and unsupervised training.
- The educational team will not be a separate group during Tjas training, neither in summer nor in winter: During Tjas training, everyone who is strong enough can simply join you, just like your fellow speeders during the winter. You can organise the extra training by yourself or with your fellow educational team members.
- Clinics/workshops: the team will take part in a few clinics and workshops over the year.
- No summer stop: there will be less supervised training (for example 1x per week), but the schedule will continue.
- Training log: keep record of your training, what the intensity was, how recovered/fit you feel, possibly measure your morning heart rate. Gain more insight into training.
- Check-up: among other things via the log and your resting heart rate. This is not to check whether or not you are training (own responsibility), but mostly to prevent people from overdoing it.
- Education: in any case about the background of training (knowing what you’re training and why) and food (build-up and recovery). Possibly other subjects too, such as race planning, technique readings etc.
- Leading a training: as a member of the educational team, you have to lead training 1x per week during a Tjas hour. You can learn to skate better by explaining skating technique during training.
- Races (in summer and winter): races are very educational, and the ultimate training motivation. So during the winter season, we expect you to at least take part in the Tjas races, Inter University Tournaments (IUTs) and the Dutch Student Championships (NSKs). The NSKs are the main goal, and you’ll work towards the NSKs that are most important to you (sprint, long track, marathon, etc.).
- Coaching races: both in Groningen and other places (at the designated races, so not every weekend) there will be a coach present.