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Two days after the 2021 Paralympics opening ceremony, Carol-Eduard Novak arrived on the Izu Velodrome 130 kilometers southwest from the Tokyo Olympic Stadium round midday to heat up for his first self-discipline, the C4-5 1000-meter time trial.
Throughout the warm-up, a photographer whistled via his enamel to draw Novak’s consideration, and after the competitors the place he completed eleventh, Novak met this reporter within the combined zone.
“The time is my private finest, so it is a good consequence for me,” Novak unhappy.
He was glad, already looking forward to his favourite occasion, the 4000-meter particular person pursuit, the following day, the place he would go on to win a silver medal.
What makes this much more fascinating is that Novak will not be solely a Paralympian, but additionally a high authorities official in his house nation of Romania. Novak’s official title is Minister of Youth and Sports activities, and he helps oversee Romania’s nationwide sports activities applications.
Since late 2020, the tasks of overseeing Romania’s sports activities ministry have taken up lots of Novak’s time — a lot, in reality, that the 45-year-old determined to alter his coaching focus.
“This 12 months, I put away all of the highway races. I had solely little or no time to coach, so I focussed on my particular program, monitor and time trial,” he mentioned. “No stage races, nothing. It was slightly bit troublesome after twenty years as a result of you will have your routine, you begin within the spring, do the highway races, now I needed to swap all of it, no races, solely coaching. However I really feel this was the proper alternative.”
Born in Miercurea Ciuc, Novak – identified to everybody merely as Edi – is an fascinating character in additional methods than one. His hometown the place he nonetheless lives along with his spouse and three kids additionally goes by the Hungarian identify Csíkszereda, and he himself has the identify Novák Károly Eduárd (in Hungarian naming customized, the household identify comes first). Csíkszereda is without doubt one of the facilities of the Szeklerland, house to the Székely or Szekler neighborhood, a Hungarian-speaking minority that types the bulk inhabitants within the northern a part of Transylvania.
Already having been elected president of the Romanian biking federation FRC since 2013, Novak entered the very best reaches of presidency late final 12 months. After the Romanian parliamentary elections, the Hungarian minority’s social gathering RMDSz/UDMR was in coalition talks with the center-right PNL and the right-wing USR-PLUS.
Throughout these talks, Novak registered his curiosity to grow to be sports activities minister:
“It occurred in a single week. I despatched a message to the president of our social gathering, and after they discovered that I’m , they mentioned, if we get this ministry within the negotiations, you’re the minister,” Novak mentioned in a December interview. “It was my very own need that drove it. Politics in Romania are very fragile, and for the game you will need to have time. In six months, you can not do something, perhaps you’ll be able to change a brand. To implement a mission correctly takes two to a few years and lots of dedication.”
One such mission is the ambition of constructing a velodrome in Romania. As of now, the nation has no lined velodrome, and its monitor cyclists, together with Novak himself, should journey to Plovdiv in Bulgaria to get monitor time.
In his youth, Novak was an avid pace skater, profitable 25 nationwide titles within the junior classes, and he additionally performed ice hockey. In 1996, at age 20, his proper foot was critically injured in a automobile accident whereas touring to a world pace skating occasion. Due to improper medical remedy, Novak’s decrease leg grew to become contaminated, and it needed to be amputated under the knee.
After a two-year restoration, Novak took up biking at an beginner degree whereas learning legislation on the College of Bucharest. Then, he started working as a lawyer full-time and coaching within the early mornings and late evenings. Concentrating totally on biking from 2001 onward, Novak completed runner-up within the Romanian time trial championships in 2002 and 2003 in a area of able-bodied cyclists. He then certified for his first Paralympics, Athens 2004, the place he completed fourth in each the highway race and the highway time trial.
In Beijing 2008, Novak was Romania’s flag bearer on the Paralympics opening ceremony, and he received the silver medal within the highway time trial. 4 years later, he was once more carrying the Romanian flag on the London Paralympics Throughout the 2012 Paralympics he set a world document within the particular person pursuit to qualify for the gold medal finals, the place he beat Jiří Ježek, a six-time Paralympic gold medalist from the Czech Republic, to win Romanian’s first Paralympic gold medal.
After ending outdoors the medals on the 2016 Paralympics, Novak determined to modify focus.
“In Rio, I used to be in one of the best type of my life and completed ninth within the highway race,” he mentioned. “On the Paralympics, our highway race is along with the C5 class. The prosthetic on my decrease proper leg is 2 kilograms of rotating ‘useless weight’, that makes it very onerous in opposition to C5 riders who’ve two functioning legs. It’s a must to specialize, and I made a decision to focus on the monitor occasions and on the person time trial on the highway.”
Novak’s background with group administration goes again to 2004 when he began an elite biking group to compete in nationwide and UCI races with able-bodied cyclists. One of many riders that joined him was his Paracycling rival Ježek. Sponsored by a Romanian mineral water model, the Tușnad Biking Workforce achieved UCI Continental Workforce standing in 2009, and the group competed in a calendar of two.2 races in Japanese Europe, and likewise in China. Renamed Workforce Novak from 2018, the group misplaced its UCI Continental standing in Might 2021, however continues to race in Japanese European 2.2 races.
The group attracted primarily Romanian and Hungarian riders, but additionally signed international expertise: Riders from Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Moldova, Russia, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Serbia, Ukraine, Italy, Germany, Spain, and France, but additionally from Australia, Argentina, Venezuela, and Colombia raced for the group all through its twelve-year historical past. Amongst these riders are fellow paracyclists Wermeser Zsombor (Hungary) and Yehor Dementyev (Ukraine), each contributors within the Tokyo Paralympics.
Along with the mayor of Csíkszereda/Miercurea Ciuc, Novak launched the two.2 Tour of Szeklerland in 2008 that has since grow to be a set occasion on the Japanese European calendar. In 2009 and 2018, he reached the rostrum of the Romanian ITT championships, and in June 2012, two months earlier than his gold medal trip in London, Novak was third within the Romanian highway race championships.
In 2018, the federation secured assist from the Romanian sports activities ministry to revive the Tour of Romania that had been on a four-year hiatus. For 2019, the 100-year anniversary of the unification of Romania, the race moved as much as 2.1 standing, becoming a member of the Sibiu Biking Tour to grow to be the second Romanian stage race on this class.
Regardless of his work in selling sport, Novak has retained his love of competitors. Throughout the Tokyo Paralympics on the Fuji Speedway, Novak completed eighth within the C4 particular person time trial, then deserted the C4-5 highway race after one lap of the extraordinarily difficult course.
“Within the highway race, once more we had been mixed with the C5 class, and I’m alone in opposition to three Frenchmen, three Italians … it’s a lottery. That’s the reason I targeted on the monitor and ITT occasions,” he mentioned.
