Speed Skating Near Kaiserslautern

[Dano]

Guten Tag,

I am sorry to write this in English as my German language skills are not adequate for long messages - I am sorry for any disrespect.

I am currently a speed skater in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. I will be moving to Germany in October and hoping to find an organization that I can skate with near the Kaiserslautern area.

I skated competitively for 6 years before I had to quit due to my job. Over the last 20 years I have skated with local organizations for recreation but did not compete until recently. This past March I competed for the first time in more than 20 years. Although my experience is indoor 100m (short) track, I will need to get use to outdoor skating since that is what is popular in Germany.

I found a website for ERV-KL http://www.skaten-kl.de/ and was happy to see there are skating opportunities close to where I will live. I do however, have a small problem. The website does not translate to English well and finding a person to contact is quite difficult and it seems they only train one day a week

I would like to know:

1. Does ERV-KL have speed skating team or is it only training?
2. Is there another organization close to Kaiserslautern who I can train with?
3. Who can I contact to get more information?

Sorry for so many questions. I am really excited to move to Germany and skate.

Any assistance you can provide would be very helpful. Please respond in German if it is easier for you. I can read German better than I can speak it

Vielen Dank

[lierenfeld]

A

[Pfälzer]

Hello,

living in Kaiserslautern, I think I can help you with your questions.

1. Does ERV-KL have speed skating team or is it only training?

The members of ERV-KL mostly focus on recreational skating. While some of them take part in competitions (kids on the track and adults on the road) they do not have a speed skating team. Having their own 250m track, they do however offer opportunities for quality training. Even though there is only 1 training session each week, members can use the track for their own training almost freeely (the track is located at the area of a local soccer team and thus might be blocked sometimes).

2. Is there another organization close to Kaiserslautern who I can train with?

~40km west of Kaiserslautern you can find ERC Homburg (I'm a member of that club, website is http://www.erc-homburg.de (german only)). Our main focus is on the education of young speed skaters for track racing (we have a 200m track) but we also have several adult members who take part in the regular training sessions (4 times a week) or meet for seperate sessions (focussing more on endurance) and participate in races as their job schedules allow.

~60km east of Kaiserslautern, in Mannheim, you can find Rhein-Neckar-Skater (http://www.rhein-neckar-skater.de - again german only), a rather new club (~2 years old). They have a growing group of speed skating members who form a team that participates in road races nationwide.

3. Who can I contact to get more information?

For ERV-KL the adress that lierenfeld already provided (skaten-inkl at web.de) should be the best way.

For ERC Homburg you can contact me via forum message or you could email to our main coach Sabrina Schäfer (schaefersabrina80 at web.de).

For Rhein-Neckar-Skater you can send email regarding the speed team to Dominik Rendant (dore at rhein-neckar-skater.de)

[Dano]

Thank you very much for the response and great information.

I look forward to Germany and skating with you all. I will probably visit all the clubs on a regular basis to get some good training in. I must admit, I have never trained for outdoor competitions, I look forward to the challenge. I guess I better start building my endurance now. I have lots more questions, but they can wait until I get to Germany.

Thanks again for your replies.

Dan Walsh