Erik Breukink

Erik Breukink (born 1 April 1964) is a former Dutch professional road racing cyclist. In 1988, Breukink won the youth competition in the Tour de France. In 1990, finished 3rd in the 1990 Tour de France. Most recently, he served as the manager of the team.

Amateur cycling years
Born in Rheden, Breukink was born in a cycling family, as his father Willem Breukink was director of the Gazelle bicycle factory. Despite this, he chose to be a footballer. In 1980 he changed to pursue a cycling career. In 1982, this appeared to be a good choice, when he won the Dutch national pursuit championship for juniors. At the 1984 Olympic Games, Erik Breukink competed with Gert Jakobs, Maarten Ducrot and Jos Alberts in the 100 km Team Pursuit and finish fourth place. In 1985, Breukink won 2 time trial stages in Olympia's Tour, and finished 3rd place overall. He decided to switch to a professional career.

Professional cycling years
Breukink made his debut as a pro in 1986 for the Skala-Gazelle team. He turned out to be a time trial specialist and was a good climber. In his Tour de France debut in 1987, he won one stage and finished second in the young rider classification. His real breakthrough in the major courses was the 1988 Giro d'Italia, where he debuted with a 2nd place, winning the Gavia Pass stage in a snowstorm. In the 1988 Tour de France he won the young rider classification and finished 13th place. In the 1989 Tour de France, he showed his time trial skills by winning the prologue, and wearing the yellow jersey for one day. In that year's Giro d'Italia, he almost won, but lost the lead in the Dolomites due to hunger. In 1990, Breukink wanted to focus on the Tour de France, so he switched to the PDM team, that allowed him to do so. In the 1990 Tour de France, the result was good, winning two stages and finishing 3rd overall. The result could even have been better, but Breukink suffered from some bad luck: in the climb to the Tourmalet Breukink had to switch bicycles three times. In 1991, Breukink together with the entire PDM-team had to leave the tour ranked 3rd, officially due to food poisoning, but it was later exposed that it was due to Intralipid. In 1992, he appeared weak, especially in his favourite time trials. In 1993, Breukink switched to the team, where his performance improved again. Bad luck followed him however, as just before the start of the 1993 Tour de France, he was hit by a car test riding the new Lotus 110. The damage to his left knee caused him to give up during the Tour. Breukink rode the Tour de France four times afterwards, but never reached his old level. In 1997 he ended his professional cycling career, having ridden 11 Tours de France and won 4 stages. He garnered 61 career victories in total.

Sports commentator
After one year as a Public Relations officer for the Rabobank-team, Breukink started as co-commentator for the NOS, covering the Tour de France. In 2002 and 2003, the GP Erik Breukink, a UCI level 2.3 course, was run, with Erik Dekker and Fabian Cancellara as winners, but it was discontinued in 2004 due to financial problems.

Team manager
On 13 January 2004, it was announced that Erik Breukink started as a team manager for the team. Thanks to his ONCE-years, Erik Breukink speaks Spanish fluently, which is helpful to communicate with the Spanish cyclists in the Rabobank team and cyclist Denis Menchov, who also speaks Spanish better than English. Since Breukink became team manager, the Rabobank cycling team's successes have included Paris–Tours, Milan–San Remo, the Brabantse Pijl (3×), the Tirreno–Adriatico (2×), the Tour de Romandie, the final classification and three stages in the Vuelta a España, 6 stages in the Tour de France and the mountains classification (2×) in the Tour de France. On, 20 July 2006, Breukink received the "médaille de la fidélité" from the Tour de France organisation, because he had been present in the Tour de France for 20 years. (11 times as rider, 1 time as PR-officer, 5 times as sports commentator and 3 times as team manager).

Major results

 * 1982
 * 1st MaillotHolanda.PNG Team pursuit, National Track Championships


 * 1984
 * 3rd Overall Olympia's Tour
 * 1st Stage 7a


 * 1985
 * Olympia's Tour
 * 1st Prologue & Stage 7a
 * 1st Stage 4b Tour de Liège


 * 1986
 * 1st Stage 4 Tour de Suisse


 * 1987
 * 1st Stage 13 Tour de France
 * 3rd Overall Giro d'Italia
 * 1st Stage 1a
 * Held Jersey pink.svg after Stages 1a–2
 * Held Jersey violet.svg after Stages 1a–3
 * Held Jersey green.svg after Stages 1a & 1b
 * 4th Grand Prix Eddy Merckx
 * 4th Circuit des Frontières
 * 6th Nokere Koerse


 * 1988
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Tour of the Basque Country
 * 1st Stages 5a & 5b (ITT)
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Critérium International
 * 1st Stage 3 (ITT)
 * 1st Omloop van het Waasland
 * Tour de France
 * 1st Jersey white.svg Young rider classification
 * 1st Stage 2 (TTT)
 * 2nd Overall Giro d'Italia
 * 1st Stage 14
 * 2nd Overall Ronde van Nederland


 * 1989
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Escalada a Montjuïc
 * 1st Stages 1a & 1b (ITT)
 * Tour de Romandie
 * 1st Prologue & Stage 4b
 * Tour de France
 * 1st Prologue
 * Held Jersey yellow.svg & Jersey green.svg after Prologue
 * 1st Stage 6b (ITT) Volta a Catalunya
 * 4th Overall Giro d'Italia
 * Held Jersey pink.svg after Stages 8 & 10–13
 * 7th Overall Nissan Classic
 * 9th Milano–Torino


 * 1990
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Nissan Classic
 * 1st Stage 2a (ITT)
 * 1st Stage 4 (ITT) Tour de Suisse
 * 1st Stage 8 (ITT) Tirreno–Adriatico
 * 1st Stage 7a (ITT) Volta a Catalunya
 * 1st Stage 1b (ITT) Vuelta a Asturias
 * 1st Grand Prix de la Libération (TTT)
 * 2nd Overall Ronde van Nederland
 * 3rd Overall Tour de France
 * 1st Stages 12 (ITT) & 20 (ITT)
 * 3rd Overall Tour DuPont
 * 10th Overall Tour of the Basque Country


 * 1991
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Tour DuPont
 * 1st Prologue & Stage 11
 * 1st Grand Prix Eddy Merckx
 * 1st Stage 8 (ITT) Tirreno–Adriatico
 * 2nd Grand Prix des Nations
 * 3rd Overall Escalada a Montjuïc
 * 3rd Overall Vuelta a Asturias
 * 3rd Road race, National Road Championships
 * 5th Overall Critérium International


 * 1992
 * 1st Giro del Piemonte
 * Tirreno–Adriatico
 * 1st Prologue & 7 (ITT)
 * 1st Stage 7 (ITT) Vuelta a España
 * 2nd Overall Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana
 * 3rd Road race, National Road Championships
 * 6th Overall Ronde van Nederland
 * 7th Overall Tour de France
 * 7th Overall Tour de Suisse
 * 8th Overall Tour of the Basque Country


 * 1993
 * 1st MaillotHolanda.PNG Road race, National Road Championships
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Critérium International
 * 1st Stage 3 (ITT)
 * 1st Jersey yellow.svg Overall Ronde van Nederland
 * 1st Stage 3b (ITT)
 * 1st Jersey blue.svg Overall Vuelta a Asturias
 * 1st Stage 1
 * 1st Stage 2 Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana
 * 4th La Flèche Wallonne
 * 5th Overall Paris–Nice
 * 7th Overall Vuelta a España
 * 8th Overall Tour of the Basque Country


 * 1994
 * 4th Time trial, UCI Road World Championships
 * 8th Overall Volta a Catalunya
 * 8th Overall Ronde van Nederland


 * 1995
 * 1st MaillotHolanda.PNG Time trial, National Road Championships
 * 2nd Overall Vuelta a Murcia
 * 2nd Subida a Urkiola
 * 4th Overall Critérium International
 * 5th Overall Ronde van Nederland
 * 6th Time trial, UCI Road World Championships


 * 1996
 * 1st Druivenkoers Overijse
 * 3rd Overall Tour de Luxembourg
 * 7th Overall Ronde van Nederland


 * 1997
 * National Road Championships
 * 1st MaillotHolanda.PNG Time trial
 * 2nd Road race
 * 3rd Overall Tour de Luxembourg
 * 5th Overall Ronde van Nederland
 * 5th Grand Prix des Nations
 * 7th Time trial, UCI Road World Championships