Sandra de Neef (born 19 March 1959 in Rotterdam) is a Dutch female

track cyclist Track cycling is a bicycle racing sport usually held on specially built banked tracks or velodromes using purpose-designed track bicycles. History Track cycling has been around since at least 1870. When track cycling was in its infancy, it wa ...

and Road cyclist. She became two times national champion in the sprint (1980 and 1983) and national champion in the omnium (1981). She competed at three

track cycling world championships The UCI Track Cycling World Championships are the set of world championship events for the various disciplines and distances in track cycling. They are regulated by the Union Cycliste Internationale. Before 1900, they were administered by the UCI ...

(1980, 1981 and 1982) in the sprint event.

Career

Early years

After finishing school she wanted to sport, but didn't know which one. She didn't like football and athletics. She fell in love with cycling after seeing 'Ahoy op Zondag' (Ahoy on Sunday), a cycling competition in Rotterdam Ahoy and the day afterwards she joined the cycling club of Ahoy. She got a bike from her uncle Ton Okhuijzen, who maintained the bicycles of the club. She started riding on the road and trained two times a day. In her first year she needed to get used to cycling and didn't perform very well. The year afterwards she was much better and was able to bijhouden elite riders like Keetie Hage and

Petra de Bruin Petra de Bruin (born 22 February 1962) is a Dutch former cyclist. UCI Track Cycling World Championships In 1979 Petra de Bruin won the road race at the World Cycling Championships,. She came third in 3 km pursuit at the UCI Track Cycling W ...

. It became clear that she had outstanding sprint capacities.

Track cycling

Due to her good sprint capacities she started riding on the track. In 1980, after three years having been riding a bicycle she won her first national title in the sprint by outsprinting

Truus van der Plaat Truus van der Plaat is a retired Dutch track and road cyclist Road cycling is the most widespread form of cycling in which cyclists ride on paved roadways. It includes Recreational cycling, recreational, Road bicycle racing, racing, Bicycl ...

in the finals. The year afterwards she became national omnium champion in 'her own' Ahoy and she won the national title in the sprint in 1983.

World Championships

At the world championships not that successful. She competed in the sprint event at the

1980 UCI Track Cycling World Championships The 1980 UCI Track Cycling World Championships were the World Championship for track cycling. They took place in Besançon, France in 1980. Due to the 1980 Summer Olympics only ten events were contested, 8 for men (5 for professionals, 3 for ama ...

in Besançon,

1981 UCI Track Cycling World Championships The 1981 UCI Track Cycling World Championships were the World Championship for track cycling. They took place in Brno, Czechoslovakia in 1981. Fourteen events were contested, 12 for men (5 for professionals, 7 for amateurs) and 2 for women. Med ...

in Brno and

1982 UCI Track Cycling World Championships The 1982 UCI Track Cycling World Championships were the World Championship for track cycling. They took place in Leicester, the United Kingdom in 1982. Fourteen events were contested, 12 for men (5 for professionals, 7 for amateurs) and 2 for wo ...

in Zürich. In 1980 she was disqualified after her Chinese opponent said De Neef had ridden her against the fence. This was denied however by De Neef, but an official protest from the coach

Jan Derksen Jan Derksen (23 January 1919 – 22 May 2011) was a Dutch professional cyclist. He was world professional track sprint champion in 1946 and 1957. He was the only rider to win a gold medal at Milan, Italy, in 1939 – in the world amateur sprint � ...

couldn't change the disqualification. The year later she lost in the first round from a Czech rider. Due to the hair on the legs of the Czech athlete De Neef responded after the race "she probably has swallowed a bit too much hormones".

Road cycling

Besides track cycling she also performed well on the road. She won

criterium A criterium, or crit, is a bike race consisting of several laps around a closed circuit, the length of each lap or circuit ranging from about 400 m to 10,000 m. Overview Race length can be determined by a number of laps or total time ...

s, finished second a race in

's-Gravenpolder s-Gravenpolder is a village in the Dutch province of Zeeland. It is a part of the municipality of Borsele, and lies about 21 kilometres east of Middelburg. History The village was first mentioned in 1318 as "dat Nuweland van Vortrap", and mean ...

in 1982 and third at the ''Batavus Lenterace'' in Heerenveen in 1983.

References

External links

profile
at ''cyclingarchives.com''
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Neef, Sandra de 1959 births Living people Dutch female cyclists Date of birth missing (living people) Dutch cyclists at the UCI Track Cycling World Championships Cyclists from Rotterdam 20th-century Dutch women