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From saving shots to shaping the sport for women: Katrine Lunde's next chapter in handball
Дата публикации: 20-08-2026 21:09:42

From saving shots to shaping the sport for women: Katrine Lunde's next chapter in handball
21 Aug. 2026
gn.editor
Thu, 08/20/2026 - 21:09
Katrine Lunde spent more than two decades standing between the posts, reading shooters, throwing her body in front of shots and winning trophies. More and more trophies. She won everything a handball player can win. And not just once, but multiple times.
Her Wikipedia entry has the medals hidden, just because there are so many titles won. Press “Show” and you will get the gist. The IHF Women’s World Championships? 3 titles plus four more medals. The Olympic Games? Three gold medals plus two bronze medals. The EHF EURO? Seven titles plus two silver medals.
And seven trophies in the EHF Champions League Women. It makes for a dizzying reading. However, Lunde did not sever connections with handball. She is still there and she tries to change the sport for the women who are playing, officiating or assisting in any role.
Sitting down to reflect on a playing career that only ended a few months ago, trophies barely come up.
"For me, handball is not to win the trophies," Lunde says.
"Of course, it's a really good part. But when I think about it now, when I'm finished, what I miss and what I'm most grateful for is all the people you meet all the way when you're active."
 
It might be a strange thing to hear from someone who won 21 medals at major international competitions with Norway. But it explains almost everything about who Lunde is, why she lasted so long in the game and why one of the first steps after ending her career was to take up an offer of becoming the chairwoman of the newly formed IHF Women's Handball Working Group.
The Working Group's first in-person meeting was the starting point for implementing the IHF Four-Year Plan 2026–2029 for Women's Handball, a strategy the IHF Council approved back in May in Basel. 
Around that table sat Nair Filipe Pires de Almeida Vilaça from Angola, Eduarda Amorim from Brazil, Mitra Noori from Iran, Saribel Deslauriers from Canada, Denmark coach Helle Thomsen, and sisters Julie and Charlotte Bonaventura, both former international referees from France. Former players, a coach, referees, administrators, they are all women who have lived handball from every possible angle, on every possible continent.
And this was the reason why all were chosen to work together to try and set up a project to improve women’s handball: because of their experience and their drive to see women’s handball thrive.
"We are eight women with different backgrounds, coming from different continents, and I think that's one of our greatest strengths. We all want to open the sport up to even more girls and women,” says the former goalkeeper.
 
Ask Lunde what the hardest part of being a woman in handball actually felt like, and her mind immediately goes to something that she lived as a player: pregnancy. It is a difficult subject for women in handball, but things have been improving, with a lot of players stopping their careers temporarily to become mothers.
"Maybe most what I feel on myself is how it is to think about getting kids, and all the challenges you have.  Negotiating contracts around a pregnancy. Figuring out communication with a club and a federation that may never have had to think about it before. Coming back afterward and proving — to a coach, to a federation, sometimes to yourself — that motherhood and elite competition aren't mutually exclusive,” says Lunde.
"I'm really proud of some steps that we have done there, but I think we can do so much more."
It's a small, human admission buried inside a much bigger institutional story, and it's exactly the kind of thing that was a taboo 20 years ago. Lunde and more and more players are living proof that it's something that is becoming the norm, upending the status quo, and becoming a thing that can be improved.
"I hope that we are many now who are showing that everything is possible.  You can be a good player, a good referee or a coach, whatever you want. And you can still have kids, your family life, and get it to be one unit."
There's a moment in the conversation where Lunde, almost as an aside, admits something that says a lot about how invisible federation structures usually are to the athletes competing under them.
 
"As a player, you don't really care about too much else than just playing and not how everything is built up,” says the former goalkeeper.
"It's very interesting. You get another view on the sport, and what's really happening around it - and all the energy and power that you need to build up something like international handball."
Lunde is candid about how strange retirement has felt, even though she insists she was ready for it. 
"People have been asking me this question for fifteen years," she says laughing slightly at how long she'd rehearsed the answer in her head before actually living it.
But rehearsal only gets you so far.
"When I read social media, all my friends are going together with the national team. I'm not part of this anymore. Then I feel like - oh, I really miss it."
But Lunde has found a way to stay close to the sport anyway. "I'm coach now for goalkeepers," she says. "When I give them exercise, I just want to do a bit with them. Still, I have something I can give them."
What's striking about listening to Lunde describe the Working Group's early priorities is how unglamorous and specific they are. Helping retiring players find real pathways into coaching, refereeing, or administration. Building educational content that shows young girls what a referee or delegate actually does day to day. Turning future Women's World Championships into genuine festivals of the sport.
"We are dreaming a lot, but we want to take it a small way. We go as best as we can, what is most important for us."
But there are challenges, of course.
“They are not the same everywhere," she says. "That's precisely why this group has been put together with members from different continents and different backgrounds."
"We want to create something that benefits the entire sport," she says. "We know we have to move one step at a time, but our overall goal is clear — to inspire more girls and women to become involved in handball."


Основное содержимое страницы с новостью.

Katrine Lunde spent more than two decades standing between the posts, reading shooters, throwing her body in front of shots and winning trophies. More and more trophies. She won everything a handball player can win. And not just once, but multiple times.

Her Wikipedia entry has the medals hidden, just because there are so many titles won. Press “Show” and you will get the gist. The IHF Women’s World Championships? 3 titles plus four more medals. The Olympic Games? Three gold medals plus two bronze medals. The EHF EURO? Seven titles plus two silver medals.

And seven trophies in the EHF Champions League Women. It makes for a dizzying reading. However, Lunde did not sever connections with handball. She is still there and she tries to change the sport for the women who are playing, officiating or assisting in any role.

Sitting down to reflect on a playing career that only ended a few months ago, trophies barely come up.

"For me, handball is not to win the trophies," Lunde says.

"Of course, it's a really good part. But when I think about it now, when I'm finished, what I miss and what I'm most grateful for is all the people you meet all the way when you're active."


It might be a strange thing to hear from someone who won 21 medals at major international competitions with Norway. But it explains almost everything about who Lunde is, why she lasted so long in the game and why one of the first steps after ending her career was to take up an offer of becoming the chairwoman of the newly formed IHF Women's Handball Working Group.

The Working Group's first in-person meeting was the starting point for implementing the IHF Four-Year Plan 2026–2029 for Women's Handball, a strategy the IHF Council approved back in May in Basel. 

Around that table sat Nair Filipe Pires de Almeida Vilaça from Angola, Eduarda Amorim from Brazil, Mitra Noori from Iran, Saribel Deslauriers from Canada, Denmark coach Helle Thomsen, and sisters Julie and Charlotte Bonaventura, both former international referees from France. Former players, a coach, referees, administrators, they are all women who have lived handball from every possible angle, on every possible continent.

And this was the reason why all were chosen to work together to try and set up a project to improve women’s handball: because of their experience and their drive to see women’s handball thrive.

"We are eight women with different backgrounds, coming from different continents, and I think that's one of our greatest strengths. We all want to open the sport up to even more girls and women,” says the former goalkeeper.


Ask Lunde what the hardest part of being a woman in handball actually felt like, and her mind immediately goes to something that she lived as a player: pregnancy. It is a difficult subject for women in handball, but things have been improving, with a lot of players stopping their careers temporarily to become mothers.

"Maybe most what I feel on myself is how it is to think about getting kids, and all the challenges you have.  Negotiating contracts around a pregnancy. Figuring out communication with a club and a federation that may never have had to think about it before. Coming back afterward and proving — to a coach, to a federation, sometimes to yourself — that motherhood and elite competition aren't mutually exclusive,” says Lunde.

"I'm really proud of some steps that we have done there, but I think we can do so much more."

It's a small, human admission buried inside a much bigger institutional story, and it's exactly the kind of thing that was a taboo 20 years ago. Lunde and more and more players are living proof that it's something that is becoming the norm, upending the status quo, and becoming a thing that can be improved.

"I hope that we are many now who are showing that everything is possible.  You can be a good player, a good referee or a coach, whatever you want. And you can still have kids, your family life, and get it to be one unit."

There's a moment in the conversation where Lunde, almost as an aside, admits something that says a lot about how invisible federation structures usually are to the athletes competing under them.

"As a player, you don't really care about too much else than just playing and not how everything is built up,” says the former goalkeeper.

"It's very interesting. You get another view on the sport, and what's really happening around it - and all the energy and power that you need to build up something like international handball."

Lunde is candid about how strange retirement has felt, even though she insists she was ready for it. 

"People have been asking me this question for fifteen years," she says laughing slightly at how long she'd rehearsed the answer in her head before actually living it.

But rehearsal only gets you so far.

"When I read social media, all my friends are going together with the national team. I'm not part of this anymore. Then I feel like - oh, I really miss it."

But Lunde has found a way to stay close to the sport anyway. "I'm coach now for goalkeepers," she says. "When I give them exercise, I just want to do a bit with them. Still, I have something I can give them."

What's striking about listening to Lunde describe the Working Group's early priorities is how unglamorous and specific they are. Helping retiring players find real pathways into coaching, refereeing, or administration. Building educational content that shows young girls what a referee or delegate actually does day to day. Turning future Women's World Championships into genuine festivals of the sport.

"We are dreaming a lot, but we want to take it a small way. We go as best as we can, what is most important for us."

But there are challenges, of course.

“They are not the same everywhere," she says. "That's precisely why this group has been put together with members from different continents and different backgrounds."

"We want to create something that benefits the entire sport," she says. "We know we have to move one step at a time, but our overall goal is clear — to inspire more girls and women to become involved in handball."

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