Jac Orie

Jac Orie is the most successful speed skating coach in the Netherlands. Since 2002, he has delivered at least one Olympic champion at every Winter Olympics, a unique series. For example, he guided Gerard van Velde (2002), Marianne Timmer (2006), Mark Tuitert (2010), Stefan Groothuis (2014), Sven Kramer, Kjeld Nuis, Carlijn Achtereekte (2018) and Thomas Krol (2022) to Olympic gold.

In addition, the 54-year-old resident of Poeldijk conquered numerous European and world titles with his skaters. For example, at the 2017 World Distance Championships in Pyeongchang, he managed to win all traditional distances in the men's event. The 500 meters became a prey for Jan Smeekens, Nuis crowned himself world champion in the 1000 and 1500 meters, while Kramer took gold in the 5 and 10 kilometers. Douwe de Vries additionally became world champion on the Team Pursuit with his compatriots. Never before did a commercial speed skating team or even country manage to take all the titles in the men's at a World Distance Championships.

His achievements as a coach not only earned him the title "Sports Coach of the Year" three times already, but also the appointment of Knight of the Order of Oranje-Nassau.

Orie approaches sports from a scientific point of view. The top coach is a movement scientist with now 5 scientific articles behind his name. Data plays a very important role in his approach. Orie has his athletes undergo many tests, which gives him an enormous amount of data with which he can determine and adjust his training approach.

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