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Henk Kraaijenhof 

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Henk Kraaijenhof (1955) started as coach in sports in 1975.

Right from the start he had the opportunity to work with elite athletes at national and international level in many sports.

He became 3 times national champion in the 400 meter with a personal best of 47.4s.

 

Originally his roots were in track and field, but he extended his expertise into other sports.

In this position he coached and advised many world class and Olympic athletes. Characteristic is his quest to discover the limits in human performance of his athletes.

He is a high-profile coach who has his own integrated and well-founded vision on sports and human performance.  

 

Henk Kraaijenhof is an excellent interface between athletes, coaches and scientists.

He is the link between theoretical knowledge, practical experience and clear reasoning.

The art of performance is probably the best expression to describe his work. 

 

Sports in which he works or has been working on at least national level:

  • athletics: Nelli Cooman, Merlene Ottey, Mary Onyali, Sandra-Farmer-Patrick, Troy Douglas, Patrick Stevens, Letitia Vriesde, Mohamed Al Malki (Oman), Olapade  Adeniken, Olga Rypakova,  Nikita Filippov and many more.

  • swimming

  • soccer (Juventus Torino, Grasshoppers Zurich)

  • rugby (English, Irish and Welsh national rugby teams)

  • volleybal (conditioning-coach for the men and women Dutch Olympic men and women)

  • field hockey (conditioning-coach for the Dutch Olympic team men)

  • handball

  • bobsled

  • judo

  • tennis (e.g. conditioning coach for Mary Pierce)

  • golf (consultant to Padraig Harrington)

 

Henk also organises his own “Helping the best to get better” - Seminar, the 4th edition had 60 attendants from 15 countries.

 

He is and was speaker or chairman at many congresses, seminars, presentations.

Amongst the subjects Henk covers are:

nutrition and nutritional supplements, strength- and powertraining, innovations, stress and stress management, brain functioning, planning and periodization, testing and measuring, etc.

Not only are his knowledge and experience widely recognized, the same goes for his clear philosophy as a visionary in sports and scientific matters.

 

Business:  director Vortx VOF (www.vortx.nl)

 

Consultation:

  • with individual elite athletes

  • with coaches

  • with coaching-staff like, doctors, physios, etc.

  • with special forces units (MARSOF of the Royal Dutch Marine Corps) 

  • with individual directors, board members and managers of multinational companies for performance enhancement and health maintenance 

 

Education:

  • lecturing at courses, presentations, congresses

  • writing articles in journals

  • education of individual coaches

 

Research:

  • independent researcher in the field of human enhancement and stress

  • applied research in the form of case-studies of elite-athletes

  • participation/contribution to scientific studies at international level like in Leuven (Belgium), Oslo (Norway), Budapest (Hungary). He has been working with scientists like Carmelo Bosco (Italy) † , Atko Viru (Estonia) † and Per Tesch (Sweden)

  • development of innovative training-methods and high-technologies

  • implementation and testing of new technologies

 

Examples of the above are: 

  • introduction of orthomolecular nutrition in sports, (1984), 

  • muscle biopsies for training-monitoring (1985), Bosco-Ergojump (1989), 

  • use of adaptogens in sports training (1993), 

  • power training (1993), biofeedback (1993), 

  • vibration training (1998), 

  • new physiological testing systems like Omegawave (2000)

  • intermittent hypoxia systems (2002)

  • flywheel-training (Per Tesch) (2002)

  • computerized resistance machine Exentrix (2012)

  • KAATSU (2017)

  • wearable resistance (2017)

  • wearable EMG (2018)

  • HeartVue 2023

 

Henk is a founding board member of the national coaches organisation NLcoach.

 

He also finds the time to write books, he wrote:

  • Orthomolecular-Nutrition in Sports (Ortho-Insitutute, Gendringen-Holland)

  • The Art of Performance, (1998-Vortx)

  • Vibration Training for Fitness and Health (2002-Elmar)

  • What We Need Is Speed (2017)

  • Methodology of Training for the 22nd Century (2019)

  • Stress, Vermoeidheid en Burn-out (in Dutch) (2020)

 

His job can be expressed in one title:

performance consultant, he helps people to perform at their best and stay healthy doing that.

To get from coach to performance consultant needed time, dedication, knowledge an experience, that is why he intensively cooperated internationally with many scientists, doctors and researchers, in order to be able find the synergy between all performance-related factors.

 

The performance consultancy specializes in:

  • nutrition

  • stress- and fatigue management and psychophysiology

  • testing for physical and mental qualities

 

These specialisations are interconnected with fundamental knowledge about training, biological adaptation, physiology, etc.

 

Kraaijenhof is an excellent interface between athletes, coaches and scientists. He is the link between theoretical knowledge, practical experience and clear reasoning.

The art of performance is probably the best expression to describe his work. 

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