Doodlewatch

The Elfstedentocht (English translation: “Journey of Eleven Cities”) is a speed skating competition and leisure skating tour held irregularly in the province of Friesland, Netherlands.

The tour, almost 200 km in length, is conducted on frozen canals, rivers and lakes between the eleven Frisian cities: Leeuwarden, Sneek, IJlst, Sloten, Stavoren, Hindeloopen, Workum, Bolsward, Harlingen, Franeker, Dokkum and finally again Leeuwarden. The tour is not held every year, mostly because not every Dutch winter permits skating on natural ice. Adding to that, the tour currently features about 15,000 amateur skaters taking part, putting high requirements on the quality of the ice. There is a stated regulatory requirement for the race to take place that the ice must be (and remain at) a minimum thickness of 15 centimetres along the entirety of the course.

There are likely to be points along the route where the ice is too thin to allow mass skating, or where there is some other problem (e.g., there is actually an organisation “Committee Elfsteden Nee” that is opposed to the race and sabotaged the route in 1997 by laying salt on the ice at one place). These are called “kluning points” (from West Frisian klúnje) and the skaters walk on their skates to the next stretch of good ice. In 1997 ice-transplantation was introduced to strengthen weak places in the ice, for instance under bridges.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elfstedentocht