Roberto Laiseka

Roberto Laiseka Jaio, born on 17 June 1969, is a Spanish former professional road racing cyclist from the Basque Country. He spent his entire professional career, thirteen seasons, with the Euskaltel-Euskadi team, riding for it from its first years as a professional squad and later being remembered as a founding rider and the last of the original team to retire. He started out with the amateur Euskaltel team in 1989, and the squad turned professional in 1994. His record was modest in number but strong in quality: five professional victories, four of them in Grand Tours. The best known came in 2001, when Euskaltel-Euskadi was invited to its first Tour de France and Laiseka won stage 14. His last win was in 2005, when he jumped away with three kilometres to go in stage 11 of the Vuelta a Espana and won by fifteen seconds ahead of the favourites. He crashed out of the 2006 Giro d'Italia with a knee injury, had a second operation in October to remove bone remnants, and retired later that year.