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      A perfectly organized European Championships


Frans Koffrie
President of KNGU

 The general opinion of athletes, trainers journalists and guests:
This was a european championship that was perfectly organised by the dutch organisers!
A big and attractive setting in the Amsterdam Rai congresshall, perfect conditions in the competition hall as well as in the 3 training halls and perfect conditions for journalists and the press, everything was taken care of and the friendly volunteer crew left hardly any wish unfulfilled.
<< Frans KOFFRIE, the  President of the  "Royal Dutch Gymnastic federation" (KNGU) was obviously pleased to hear our praise.
"Our federation is also very happy with the overall organisation and the atmosfere, the general calm and professional attitude can be felt everywhere. We were specially happy with the enthiousiasm of the audience, which not only supported the local favourites but showed their appreciation for every good achievement indifferent from which country the gymnast was.“

How would you rate the attention from the press and the public for this event?

F.Koffrie: "A total of 18 tv cameras were used to record the event, including a camera attached to a cable running over the free exercise floor and a rolling camera tracking the gymnasts at the vault. The Dutch broadcasting company NOS has put a lot of effort in this event, they were present with a crew of 85 perople. Over 100 journalists from all over the world have reported on the event and our newspappers have placed large articles on the championships avery day. The fact that our crown prince  Willem-Alexander, attended the championship underlines the importance of this event clearly. This was the first royal visit for gymnastics since the celebrations of 150 years KNGU in 1993..

At the pre-olympic test event in Athens the company Janssen-Fritsen already provided perfect conditions for the gymnasts. Here in Amsterdam the same applied. The equipment in the competition hall as well as in the training halls were of olympic quality. In common praise the newly constructed spring boards "IRIS" and “Kreon“ were received, ..

... but above all the properties of the new “Apollo Diagonal“ floor were praised.  „This brings about a completely new dimension for the athletes, as the push of and landing properties are completely the same over the entire floor and also where it counts most in the diagonals", comented the german coach Dieter Koch and his gymnast Yvonne Musik, who vaulted over the Pegases vaulting table to the 8 best gymnasts of this european championship.


In Final at Pegases:Yvonne Musik
 - first final after 14 years for Germany

 

Marina Witte is a member of the dutch journalists association and responsible for the professional organisation of the journalistic work at major sports events and has taken care of many different sports events in this capacity:

 „The overall conclusion after this european championship from the point of view of the host and organisers is perfect, the response very good. There were no notewothy problems apart from the light in the hall...“
The poor lightning caused problems for fotographers and cameramen, but that was indeed the only real  problem, everything else ran like clockwork.


Marina Witte


Einige nur eines Super-Gastgeberteams!

250 Volunteers
were active, in the press centre alone - with a lot of space, 80 workingplaces at the press tribune, free DSL connections, 10 internet PC’s and 70 connections for Laptops – 16 volunteers were assisting the press.

 „We had 102 accredited journalists and tv people on site and 42 fotographers.“, according to  Marina Witte, who was very pleased with the major reporting and the large crowd of fans that turned up.
„Gymnastics does not have the same standing as soccer... and as the entry tickets were not very cheap it is very nice to see the number of people that attended the championship.“

The very good atmosfere in the hall was no surprise to her: „This is the case allways and everywhere were dutch fans go we are a happy people …“

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