Five million watch Timmer win gold

20 February 2006

AMSTERDAM — Approximately five million Dutch viewers tuned in on Sunday to see Marianne Timmer win the women’s 1,000m speed skating title at the Winter Olympics in Turin.

Timmer, who was disqualified in the 500m event on a controversial false start, beat a number of favourites in a time of one minute 16.05 seconds.

A double 1998 Olympic champion in the 1,000 and 1,500 at the Nagano Games, Timmer, 31, said she didn’t expect herself to win the gold medal. “After the 500m race I had a bad feeling about the whole Olympics. Today everything was OK,” she said.

Canada’s Cindy Klassen came in second place in the 1,000m, 0.04 seconds behind Timmer. Germany’s Anni Friesinger, the favourite, came third, a further 0.02 seconds behind.

Dutch news organisation NOS said 4.7 million Dutch viewers watched the entire television broadcast on Sunday and 5.7 million were watching when she received the gold medal.

Some 4.4 million people watched the men’s 1,000m on Saturday and an average of 1.4 million people tune in every day to the coverage of the Turin Games.

Subject: Dutch news + Marianne Timmer