Johan van der Velde

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Johan van der Velde (born December 12, 1956 in Rijsbergen, southern Netherlands) is a Dutch cyclist. In the 1980 Tour de France he won the Maillot blanc, or white jersey, for being the best young rider under 25, also placing 12th overall that year. In the 1981 Tour de France he took first place on the 2nd and 21st stages, finishing 12th overall for the second year in a row. He rode with team Ti Raleigh in the Tour de France from 1979 to 1983, and Panasonic in 1986.

He was distinctive in the peloton for his lean, long-legged appearance, his smooth pedalling style and his long hair. He rode in support of riders such as Joop Zoetemelk, whom he could pace over mountains at impressive speed, but he was also capable of winning on his own. Success came to him early and, he said in an interview with the author Jan Siebelink ("Pijn is genot") that he had trouble coping when that success began to dry up. Van der Velde said he remembered shivering at the start of an Italian race, the skin of his arms wrinkled in goosebumps, because of the amphetamine he had taken just to start.

Addiction to amphetamine and a lifelong habit of petty theft, which he said came from seeing his father bring home things he had stolen from work, brought him into trouble with the law. He was caught stealing lawnmowers and breaking into post office stamp machines to raise money to cover his addiction and his gambling. The jail sentence and the loss of all he had won forced him and his Belgian wife, Josée, to sell the villa they had owned. They moved into a series of anonymous houses and apartments. Van der Velde began hospital treatment for his addiction and became deeply religious. He began work on building sites, rarely saying who he was or what he had been, to rebuild his self-esteem. For many years he tried to keep his address and his identity secret. He rarely speaks to the press.

His manager at Ti-Raleigh, Peter Post, said he had always considered Van der Velde the son that he had never had.