Natural ice skating marathon likely on Wednesday; Skating fun to end by Friday

The ice club in the Winterswijk in Gelderland hopes for an ice skating marathon on natural ice on Wednesday. The match is possible if there are 3 centimeters of ice. "At this moment, there is 1 centimeter," said Auke Spijkstra, the Winterwijk ice club chairman.

"It has snowed and has not frozen as hard as we thought," Spijkstra added. "We have stopped spraying for now. When we can proceed, we will."

The ice skating club's spraying team started preparing the 400-meter track for a possible marathon on Sunday evening. It is expected that this will take three nights. The ice rink has, therefore, not previously been accessible to skating enthusiasts.

Weeronline has stated that ice skating is possible at several places in the country for a few days, but the fun on the ice will be finished by the end of the week. It will be cold until Wednesday, with temperatures around freezing during the day and light to moderate frost at night. After that, the temperature will probably rise again to above zero.

According to the weather agency, the chance to skate on shallow waters, flooded meadows, and sheltered ditches is greatest this week in the country's east. "But it is all very local. It will probably not be possible in the west; it is not cold enough there," says meteorologist Wouter van Bernebeek. It will probably thaw again from Friday or Saturday. The temperatures next week are still uncertain, but according to Van Bernebeek, we can possibly expect "a pinch of cold" again.

The first natural skating rinks opened on Monday in Doorn (Utrecht) and De Lier (Zuid-Holland). The Royal Dutch Skating Federation (KNSB) expects more sprayed rinks to open in the coming days.

According to Weeronline, the last time there was a "really good winter period" in the Netherlands was in February 2021. Back then, skating on large lakes such as the Veluwemeer was also possible.