After countless time trial titles and 20 years in professional cycling, Ellen van Dijk is calling it a day after this season. Her career began 19 years ago with Team Vrienden van het Platteland, for whom van Dijk rode as a professional for the first time in 2006. On the track, the young rider from the Netherlands went straight to the top at the World Championships - in 2008 she won the gold medal in the scratch race.
Serial winner on the time trial
In 2013, van Dijk triumphed in the overall classification at the Bloeizone Fryslân Tour, which she would finish as the best female rider a total of five times, and crowned her season with the world title in the individual time trial. Just one year later, she celebrated her first major success in a one-day race, winning the Tour of Flanders. The Dutchwoman secured the European individual time trial title four years in a row, from 2016 to 2019, adding two more victories at Dwars door Vlaanderen and one at the Omloop van het Hageland. A full eight years after her first world championship title in the individual time trial, she won it again and also triumphed in the European road race. Van Dijk also defended her world championship title the following year.
After a year off for pregnancy in 2023, Ellen van Dijk returned to cycling for two more years, ending her career this season with the words "I still really enjoy it. And I think that time trialling is the most beautiful thing there is, but cycling is not just about time trialling".
Leon Weidner
Working student
