Nat Utrecht swim club in The Netherlands will celebrate it's 20 year anniversary next September 2017, but in anticipation to mark the occasion the club has pulled out all the stops for the coming year. Already there has been a reunion of past members, and they have held their annual club championships which was a great success. Today, Annable Kosten and Haike Eva van Stralen came to share their knowledge and insights with the "Natters". The morning started off with an overview of what the session would involve, followed by a 90 minute session in the pool, which covered everything from the stretching, warm up, stoke, breathing, starts and finishes.
Mental preparation is one of the most important factors of any Olympic athlete and the swimmers shared some specific techniques to the team. Armed with numerous tips from the Olympians, the morning session ended with a 14 team relay race, but with a difference! Each team had to wear a t-shirt and pass it to the next swimmer, which added to the excitement of the friendly competition!
Once the race had ended, all swimmers retired to the cafe for some cake and presentation of the prizes.
The current EGLSF general secretary, John Ryan, who is a member of Nat Utrecht, took part in the Olympic training session. It was a fantastic opportunity to learn first hand from such experienced swimmers and everyone at Nat Utrecht benefited greatly from the training.
On behalf of the EGLSF, we would like to wish Nat Utrecht the very best for the coming year and look forward to attending the anniversary celebrations next September. Special thanks to the organising committee, the board of Nat Utrecht, and of course Annable and Haike Eve for such a great workout!
Nat Utrecht
Annabel Kosten is a retired freestyle swimmer from the Netherlands, who won the bronze medal with the Dutch women's 4×100 m freestyle relay team at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece.
Haike Eva van Stralen is a Dutch former swimmer, who specialized in freestyle events. She is a two-time Olympian (2000 and 2004), and double Dutch short-course champion in the 200 and 400 m freestyle. Van Stralen also played for De Kempvis Swimming Club in Spijkenisse, under her personal coach Dick Bergsma.
Van Stralen made her first Dutch team, as a 17-year-old teen, at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney. She placed eleventh, along with Carla Geurts, Chantal Groot, and Manon van Rooijen, in the 4×200 m freestyle relay with a time of 8:08.53.
Four years later, at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Van Stralen competed again in the women's 4×200 m freestyle relay as a member of the Dutch team. She claimed the 200 m freestyle from the Dutch National Championships in Amsterdam, posting her relay entry time of 2:02.21. Teaming with Groot, Marleen Veldhuis, and Celina Lemmen in heat two, van Stralen swam a second leg, and lowered her personal best to 2:01.80. Van Stralen and the entire Dutch team missed the top 8 final by almost two seconds, finishing only in fifth place and ninth overall with a final time of 8:08.96