His plan has been on the table for twenty years, but on Saturday Hans Vink from Werkendam will finally be fulfilled his dream. Then swim, cycle and run more than a hundred participants through the Noordwaard of the Biesbosch, to honor the so -called Linecrossers. “A unique group that deserves separate attention.”
During the commemoration of the dead in 2005, Hans started talking to two linecrossers, men who maintained connections between occupied and liberated area in the Netherlands at the end of the Second World War. “I wanted to do something else to keep their history alive,” he says. A former colleague inspires him to organize a triathlon. Hans does not yet know that this will require twenty years of perseverance.
“If that doesn’t work, then it will stop for me.”
Because a triathlon is still relatively unknown in the region in 2005, the local sports clubs are not to jump. This will change in 2023, when the son of one of the 21 Linecrossers comes to Hans. He asks if he doesn’t want to try again to get the triathlon off the ground. “If that doesn’t work, then it will stop for me.”
In the middle of the front line
A triathlon with a story, that is the goal of the Stichting ‘Triathlon de Line Crossers’ Biesbosch Werkendam founded by Hans. As a child he often goes fishing with one of the former Linecrossers in the Biesbosch. “Uncle Cornelis then told about the past.” From his house, canoes left through the Biesbosch, via Werkendam to Drimmelen.
The Biesbosch is located in November 1944 in the middle of the front line, between the liberated south and the still occupied north. There are people in hiding, resistance groups make 75 German soldiers prisoners, but also stranded pilots are transferred to liberated area, including a general who was stranded during Operation Market Garden. “They endanger their lives with every one and return,” says Hans. They make a total of more than 370 crossings.
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Willpower and determination
For those crossings Continuation is needed. A feature that Hans also had more than needed in the last twenty years to bring the sporting event to Werkendam. It cost blood, sweat and tears, but on Saturday it is finally time. Then the Noordwaard of the Biesbosch, which during the Second World War was the connection between liberated and occupied area, the backdrop for half a triathlon.
The route that the athletes travel reflects the willpower and the determination of the linecrossers during the Second World War. Participants must swim for 1.9 kilometers within an hour. They must then cycle 92 kilometers within two hours and fifteen minutes. Finally, they have three hours to complete a half marathon, a distance of 21.1 kilometers. Incidentally, it is also possible to participate in a relay form. Hans expects more than 130 participants. “They have to give everything to get over the finish line on time and to be able to say: ‘I’ve crossed the line’. “
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