Hennie Kuiper

Hennie Kuiper is a Dutch former professional road racing cyclist, born on 3 February 1949 in Denekamp in the province of Overijssel. He built his reputation first as an amateur, winning 39 races between the ages of 19 and 23, and he took the Olympic road race gold medal at Munich in 1972 by riding the last 40 kilometres alone. As a professional from 1973 he became world road race champion in 1975 and finished second in the Tour de France in 1977 and 1980, winning the Alpe d'Huez stage in 1977 and 1978. In the 1980s he reinvented himself as a one-day specialist and won four of the five Monument classics: the Tour of Flanders, the Giro di Lombardia, Paris-Roubaix and Milan-San Remo. After retiring in 1988 he worked as a team manager.