Michael Boogerd (born 28 May 1972) is a Dutch former professional road bicycle racer. He was one of the leaders of a generation of Dutch cyclists in the late 1990s and early 2000s, together with teammate Erik Dekker and female cyclist Leontien van Moorsel.
Career Boogerd was born and grew up in The Hague. In primary school, he was in the same class as later professional tennis player Richard Krajicek. He began his professional career in 1994, joining WordPerfect. In 1995 the team changed name to Novell, before Rabobank in 1996 became main sponsor and name for the team. Boogerd stayed with the team his entire career.
His speciality were hilly classics like Liège–Bastogne–Liège, La Flèche Wallonne and the Amstel Gold Race in the Ardennes week and the Lombardian races in the Fall, as well as mountain-stages. He has won two stages in Tour de France (1996, 2002) as well as the Amstel Gold Race and Paris–Nice. He has been Dutch Champion three times, in 1997, 1998 and in 2006. In addition to these major victories, Boogerd scored a large number of podium finishes in his favorite spring classics.
In the 1998 Tour de France, Boogerd finished 5th overall in the General classification, his highest finish ever in the Tour de France. Boogerd was also fined 1250 Swiss Francs for not wearing his national champion jersey in the prologue of that year. His main result in the 2005 Tour de France was on stage 15, where he finished 4th, 57 seconds behind stage winner, George Hincapie. Also in the Tour de France 2005, he was punished with twenty seconds at Stage 9 of the race. In the 2006 Tour de France, Boogerd's role was to support Rabobank team leader Denis Menchov in the Alps and Pyrenees. He rode exceptionally well helping his team captain to 6th overall and Michael Rasmussen to the Polka Dot jersey.
In the 2007 Tour de France Boogerd rode, again, very well. This time his teammate Michael Rasmussen was the leader of the race until the latter was fired after the last stage in the Pyrenees. On the Thursday before the start of this Tour, Boogerd infused himself with water in the early morning, before the UCI agents could arrive. His hematocrit level namely was 50, "on the edge of the edge". During the Tour, Boogerd and Thomas Dekker used cortisone (Diprofos) under a fake attest every day, and administered eight times 2000 entities of Dynepo.
Boogerd ended his career in 2007, with a 12th place in the World Championship road race in Stuttgart. His planned last race was the 2007 Giro di Lombardia, but a fall in the weeks before made him unable to participate.Cyclingheroes.info: Boogerd has to stop cycling even before his planned fare well in the Giro di Lombardia 2007 , retrieved January 15, 2008
After his active career, Boogerd has done freelance promotional activities for Rabobank, and is frequently seen or heard on TV during live coverage of major races, both on Dutch and Belgian television.
Boogerd was appointed team manager of Team Roompot, a UCI Professional Continental cycling team launching in 2015.
Doping
Allegations that Boogerd used performance-enhancing drugs were made since at least 2008, when Bernhard Kohl, who had finished third in the 2008 Tour de France but was stripped of that honor after testing positive for CERA, a variant of EPO accused his manager Stefan Matschiner. Matschiner, in turn, named a number of athletes whom he had supplied with drugs and blood transfusions, including Boogerd (whose name appeared in Matschiner's files). Until early 2013, Boogerd continued to deny. He finally admitted, in a television interview on 6 March 2013 (seen by nearly a million viewers), to having used EPO, blood transfusions and cortisone from 1997 to 2007. In October 2014, he was approached by the Belgian federation, allegedly to offer him to shorten his proposed ban in exchange for naming other dopers and he answered this: "The Belgian federation had the same proposal as the Dutch Doping Authority had. I will be suspended for a long period, or I will have to talk about other people. I refuse to do that. I rather be suspended for life". In January 2016 he received a two-year suspension and his results from 2005 to 2007 were annulled.
Major results
1993 8th Omloop van het Houtland 1996 1st Stage 6 Tour de France 3rd Seraing–Aachen–Seraing 10th Brabantse Pijl 1997 1st Road race, National Road Championships 1st Profronde van Heerlen 3rd Brabantse Pijl 4th Overall Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré 7th Nokere Koerse 8th Overall Setmana Catalana de Ciclisme 1998 1st Road race, National Road Championships 1st Overall Setmana Catalana de Ciclisme 1st Stage 3 2nd Overall Route du Sud 2nd Giro di Lombardia 3rd Brabantse Pijl 4th Overall Tour of the Basque Country 4th Amstel Gold Race 4th Rund um den Henninger Turm 4th Flèche Ardennaise 5th Overall Tour de France 5th Liège–Bastogne–Liège 5th Tour du Haut Var 6th Road race, UCI Road World Championships 10th Grand Prix Eddy Merckx 1999 1st Overall Paris–Nice 1st Amstel Gold Race 1st Giro dell'Emilia 1st Gran Premio Bruno Beghelli 1st Stage 5a Tour of the Basque Country 2nd Overall Tour Méditerranéen 2nd Overall Setmana Catalana de Ciclisme 2nd Liège–Bastogne–Liège 2nd Brabantse Pijl 3rd Breitling Grand Prix (with Erik Dekker) 4th Overall Giro della Provincia di Reggio Calabria 4th Classic Haribo 5th La Flèche Wallonne 6th Züri-Metzgete 8th Coppa Sabatini 9th Clásica de San Sebastián 10th Overall Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana 1st Stage 5 10th Overall Tour de Luxembourg 2000 1st Stage 7 Tirreno–Adriatico 2nd Amstel Gold Race 5th Gran Premio Industria e Commercio di Prato 6th Coppa Sabatini 8th Overall Tour de Suisse 8th Brabantse Pijl 9th Overall Tour of the Basque Country 2001 1st Overall Setmana Catalana de Ciclisme 1st Brabantse Pijl 1st Trofeo Alcúdia 2nd Overall Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana 1st Points classification 1st Stages 1 & 4 2nd Overall International Rheinland-Pfalz Rundfahrt 1st Stage 1 3rd Overall Tirreno–Adriatico 1st Stage 7 3rd Giro di Lombardia 4th Road race, National Road Championships 5th Liège–Bastogne–Liège 6th Overall Volta ao Algarve 7th Overall Tour of the Basque Country 1st Points classification 9th Amstel Gold Race 9th La Flèche Wallonne 10th Overall Tour de France 2002 1st Peperbus Profspektakel 1st Stage 16 Tour de France 1st Stage 6 Ronde van Nederland 3rd Overall Tour Méditerranéen 3rd Overall Ster Elekrotoer 3rd Amstel Gold Race 4th Overall Tour of the Basque Country 4th Coppa Sabatini 6th Giro di Lombardia 9th La Flèche Wallonne 9th Brabantse Pijl 2003 1st Brabantse Pijl 2nd Amstel Gold Race 3rd Liège–Bastogne–Liège 4th Overall Tirreno–Adriatico 4th Züri-Metzgete 6th Road race, UCI Road World Championships 6th Overall Tour Méditerranéen 7th Overall Ronde van Nederland 8th Clásica de San Sebastián 9th Overall Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana 9th Tour of Flanders 10th Giro di Lombardia 2004 2nd Liège–Bastogne–Liège 2nd Giro di Lombardia 2nd Amstel Gold Race 2nd Brabantse Pijl 3rd Coppa Sabatini 4th Overall Tour Méditerranéen 5th Overall Ster Elekrotoer 6th Overall Tirreno–Adriatico 7th Road race, UCI Road World Championships
2005 2nd Amstel Gold Race 3rd Liège–Bastogne–Liège 6th Overall Tour de Pologne 7th Overall Tour of the Basque Country 2006 1st Road race, National Road Championships 1st Peperbus Profspektakel 3rd Amstel Gold Race 4th Züri–Metzgete 5th Overall Tirreno–Adriatico 5th Liège–Bastogne–Liège 8th Giro di Lombardia 2007 1st Peperbus Profspektakel 3rd Overall 3-Länder-Tour 4th Road race, National Road Championships 5th Amstel Gold Race 6th Liège–Bastogne–Liège 6th Brabantse Pijl 9th Tour of Flanders 10th Overall Tirreno–Adriatico
Grand Tour general classification results timeline
Grand Tour 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 Giro d'Italia———————17————— Tour de France—3116556DNF10123274241212 Vuelta a España42——49———————DNF—
+ Legend — Did not compete DNF Did not finish
See also List of Dutch Olympic cyclists
References
External links