# 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 Rabobank team.

## Biography
### 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 ONCE 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 Rabobank 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).

## Career achievements
### Major results
#### 1982

    1st 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 after Stages 1a–2
       Held after Stages 1a–3
       Held after Stages 1a & 1b
    4th Grand Prix Eddy Merckx
    4th Circuit des Frontières
    6th Nokere Koerse

#### 1988

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

#### 1989

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

#### 1990

    1st 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 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 Road race, National Road Championships
    1st Overall Critérium International
       1st Stage 3 (ITT)
    1st Overall Ronde van Nederland
       1st Stage 3b (ITT)
    1st 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 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 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

### Grand Tour general classification results timeline

| Grand Tour | 1986 | 1987 | 1988 | 1989 | 1990 | 1991 | 1992 | 1993 | 1994 | 1995 | 1996 | 1997 |
| Giro d'Italia | 71 | 3 | 2 | 4 | — | — | — | — | — | 59 | — | — |
| Tour de France | — | 21 | 12 | DNF | 3 | DNF | 7 | DNF | 29 | 20 | 34 | 52 |
| Vuelta a España | — | — | — | — | — | — | 27 | 7 | 19 | — | — | — |