ASF-2011-01
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10 Adirondack Sports & Fitness<br />
www.WinAFreeKayak.com<br />
ATHLETE PROFILE<br />
hen speedskater Petra Acker was<br />
Wyoung and attending morning sessions<br />
at the Knickerbacker Arena in Troy,<br />
her grandfather, himself an accomplished<br />
skater, would time her.<br />
“Opa, I know I can go faster!” the young<br />
Petra would exclaim. That is a phrase she<br />
can use again and again. The spirit to aim<br />
for a faster time has stayed with her since<br />
she started skating as a seven-year-old<br />
with her grandfather to fulfill her home<br />
school physical education requirement.<br />
Petra Acker’s grandfather is Howard<br />
Ganong, who has earned five National<br />
titles and two North American championships<br />
as a master’s skater. Petra and her<br />
family had returned from Africa, where<br />
her father was rebuilding an orphanage<br />
for Good Samaritan, a Christian relief<br />
organization. When she returned and<br />
entered the New York school system, she<br />
had to complete physical education units<br />
each year. Enter a grandfather with blades<br />
on his feet.<br />
After a couple of years of skating to<br />
keep physically fit with family, she realized<br />
it was more than just dodge ball for<br />
gym class... It was something more exciting.<br />
Jim “Casey” Wager, who had been<br />
coaching young skating athletes for many<br />
years, entered the picture. He coached her<br />
by starting with the basics – a teaching<br />
method that has made him the primary<br />
coach for young athletes in the region.<br />
After graduating, so to speak, from<br />
Casey’s developmental work in the morning,<br />
nine-year-old Petra started training<br />
with Capital District Speedskating Club,<br />
who used the ice at the Knickerbacker<br />
Arena for Monday night practices.<br />
<br />
<br />
Age: 17<br />
Family: Parents, Don and<br />
Cindy Acker<br />
Hometown: Clifton Park<br />
Primary Sport: Long Track Speedskating<br />
Secondary Sport: Short Track Speedskating<br />
Other Interests: Ballroom Dancing,<br />
Singing and Acting<br />
Petra<br />
Acker<br />
by Janit Stahl<br />
The foundation built by Casey has<br />
remained with Petra, who began her competitive<br />
career, expanded her training to<br />
include the Tuesday and Thursday night<br />
practices with the Saratoga Winter Club,<br />
one of the most successful short track<br />
speedskating teams in the country.<br />
“I think ever since I was little I was very<br />
competitive... I’m an only child too... I like<br />
to be with my friends and other people,<br />
but I am used to driving myself,” Petra says<br />
of her ability to stay focused in this sport<br />
where technical accuracy and extreme<br />
discipline are required for success.<br />
While she was skating at Knickerbacker,<br />
Paul Marchese, the technical advisor for<br />
the 2002 Olympic speedskating squad<br />
and coach of 2<strong>01</strong>0 long track Olympian<br />
Trevor Marsicano from Ballston Spa was<br />
on the ice, “But he was working with the<br />
faster kids, like Trevor,” says Petra.<br />
Just a couple years later, Petra became<br />
“One of the faster kids.” She entered<br />
and won several of the regional races<br />
for speedskating in Rochester, Syracuse,<br />
Walpole (Mass.) and Newburgh – all part<br />
of the circuit familiar to skating families.<br />
These races are short track on 111-meter<br />
ice hockey rink. She liked the excitement<br />
and speed of the sport, which is entirely<br />
different not only in theory but by competitive<br />
standards than long track skating.<br />
The International Skating Union treats<br />
the short track and long track versions<br />
as entirely different sports – those who<br />
watched the Olympics in Vancouver can<br />
relate. The 400-meter oval long track races<br />
are match races with two skaters going<br />
head-to-head to get the best time. Short<br />
track is like roller derby with five skaters<br />
jockeying for position and close physical<br />
contact.<br />
It was a distinction that was becoming<br />
clearer to Petra as she trained and raced<br />
short track and long track in the past four<br />
years. She won the ladies division at the<br />
annual Jack Shea Sprints in Lake Placid on<br />
the Olympic Speedskating Oval for three<br />
years (’08, ’09, ‘10) locally, and took her<br />
talent to US Junior Long Track National<br />
Championship in Milwaukee for two<br />
years (’09 and ‘10), and earned first and<br />
second in her category. She was concurrently<br />
racing American Cup and US Junior<br />
Short Track championships. It was a lot of<br />
wear and tear on her body, one that was<br />
growing. The lanky girl was becoming a<br />
willowy young lady. And most short track<br />
speedskaters are not that tall (think fivefoot,<br />
eight-inch Apolo Anton Ohno). Petra<br />
is built more like the Dutch athletes that<br />
dominate the long track in international<br />
competition.<br />
“This is my first year just skating long<br />
track,” Petra says. “I started doing long<br />
track four years ago and I wanted to stay<br />
in short track, but Junior Worlds were the<br />
same weekend so I had to decide,” she<br />
explains. “It is difficult to switch back and<br />
forth.”<br />
“I think it fits my personality,” she<br />
asserts, of long track-style racing. “It is<br />
not as stressful,” says the teenager with<br />
an easy smile and a relaxed personality.<br />
In 2009, she was a member of the Junior<br />
World long track team that competed in<br />
Zakopane, Poland, and competed in the<br />
Junior World Cup in Calgary, earning a<br />
podium spot with a bronze in the 1,000<br />
meters.<br />
Petra won the <strong>2<strong>01</strong>1</strong> US All-Around<br />
Speedskating Championship on Dec. 31<br />
in Kearns, Utah. She took first-place in the<br />
5,000-meter race (7:47.26, a PR), fourth<br />
in the 1,500-meter race (2:03.49, a PR),<br />
and fifth in the 500-meter race (41.39).<br />
She clinched the title when point leader<br />
Jilleanne Rookard skipped the 5,000-<br />
meter race.<br />
This year, Petra still has to qualify to<br />
be on the Junior Worlds team at a Petit<br />
Ice Arena meet in Milwaukee, which was<br />
the training ice for the 2<strong>01</strong>0 Olympic<br />
team. If she qualifies in February she<br />
goes to the Junior World Championships<br />
in Finland, and a Junior World Cup in the<br />
Netherlands.<br />
“Next year, after high school graduation,<br />
I will be moving to Salt Lake City or<br />
Milwaukee to train,” the senior says.<br />
Her mother, Cindy, feels her competitive<br />
edge comes from understanding<br />
her God-given talent, and being driven by<br />
the responsibility for her potential to be<br />
realized.<br />
“In some ways it was very easy to have<br />
her at home. She always worked to complete<br />
her schoolwork and was even more<br />
driven when compared to her home school<br />
co-op classmates (at Grace Fellowship<br />
Church in Latham). Other than that, she<br />
is a diva a bit... She gets really tired from<br />
training,” says Cindy Acker.<br />
The family has gone on several missions,<br />
including spending last summer<br />
in Haiti. Petra brought along one of her<br />
greatest competitors in the sport, speedskater<br />
Rebecca Byrud.<br />
Ultimately she wants to be a child psychologist<br />
with the organization Love 146,<br />
a non-profit who rescues young women<br />
brought into the world of child prostitution.<br />
“Petra always knows it is not about<br />
just her, she has a lot to give,” says her<br />
mother.<br />
Although she has a serious and compassionate<br />
side, evident in her mission and<br />
social work, Petra has a lot of fun too. One<br />
of her favorite past times is ballroom dancing.<br />
She dances at the Fred Astaire Dance<br />
Studio in Latham, but this Ginger Rogers<br />
has some world-class dancing legs!<br />
In the immediate future, Petra is preparing<br />
for National Junior team qualification<br />
meet in Milwaukee. Ultimately, her<br />
goal is the 2<strong>01</strong>4 Winter Olympics in Sochi,<br />
Russia. Three years and lots of travel in<br />
between, but she is up for it. “I love to<br />
travel!”<br />
Janit Stahl (janitstahl@gmail.com) is a<br />
Greenfield Center freelance writer. Her<br />
daughter Greta is a speedskater in the<br />
Saratoga Winter Club.