article by Nicola Pucci
Brabantino di Rijsbergen, class 1960, Jacques Hanegraaf has such an incomplete track record that he believes, in his case, that the substance was not equal to the style and talent shown in his youth.
In fact, this long-limbed and aesthetically pleasing runner on a bicycle, he has long been a great hope of Dutch cycling. An athlete who could and should have prolong the glories of the previous generation, probably the strongest in the history of the pedal “orange“that of Kuiper, Knetemann, Raas and Zoetemelk (each of them capable of wearing the rainbow jersey of world champion, between 1975 and 1985), who when Hanegraaf was expected to make the definitive leap in quality, were spending the last pennies of absolutely excellent careers.
Among the new Dutch cycling talents, Hanegraaf, already Dutch champion among the juniors in 1979, was the one to be preferred, also because from a young age the results were on his side. Excellent amateur (at just 19 years old he was selected for the Olympic trials in Moscow, where he was 15th in both the road race and the 100 kilometer team event), he soon became a professional, at just 20 years oldinside the battleship Ti-Raleigh directed by Peter Post, and the response was immediately convincing, like a champion.
In 1981in fact, the young man from Rijsbergen won the Maastricht GP, the Heerenhoek GP, the Maastricht-Amby GP and, above all, beating Knetemann and Andri Van der Poel (Mathieu’s father and another awaited talent in Dutch cycling), becomes national road champion. E the following year it confirmed itself at high levelsfirst winning the challenging Aargau Canton GP, in Gippingen, Switzerland, again overtaking Van der Poel, and putting the first great classic of his career in his pocket, the Paris-Brusselsahead of the group by 3″ beaten in the sprint by the Frenchman Pascal Jules.
Not yet 22 years old, Hanegraaf already has two seasons under his belt marked by a couple of notable successes, and the role of great hope seems likely to be confirmed by the final response of the road. But that’s not really the case, because already 1983, the last in Peter Post’s pay, did not give Jacques great satisfactionwinner at the opening of the season of two stages at the Etoile de Besseges and of the Borges Blanques stage at the Tour of Catalonia but then unable to shine in the great classics (only a fourth place at the Amstel Gold Race), undoubtedly the races that best adapt to his characteristics as a fast pacemaker.
In 1984 Hanegraaf passa alla Quantuma team that debuts in big cycling with the ambition of opposing the Ti-Raleighand, to be honest, the season seems to relaunch in style the effectiveness and beauty of the pedaling of the talented Brabant rider, capable of adding up to ten victories (albeit essentially circuits, which in Holland are fashionable and pay well), including the Amstel Gold Race, dominated with a remarkable solo ride, leaving the pursuers over two minutes behind. And in addition to seventh place in Paris-Roubaix (he will be eighth in 1989), too at the Tour de France Hanegraaf left evidence of his potential, winning the classification ahead of Hinaultflying goals“the only terrain in which the great Breton can compete, freed from the oppression of the repeated blows inflicted on him by Laurent Fignon, and wearing the yellow shirt for two dayswon in the Louvroil stage, curiously still with a 1″ advantage over Van der Poel, his teammate at the Quantum.
But even Hanegraaf’s excellent 1984 does not announce an equally bright future, and the handsome athlete from Rijsbergen, despite regaining the Dutch road title in 1985this time ahead of Gerard Veldscholten, a stage victory at the Tour of Holland and some placings in the great classics such as second place at Het Volk (behind Eddy Planckaert) and eighth at Ghent-Wevelgem, he seems to be heading towards a good career more as a luxury lieutenant of champions stronger than him than as a star of the first magnitude on the international cycling scene.
Among his successes in the years between 1986 and 1993, which saw him wearing the jerseys of Toshiba, TVMStill Panasonic (ex Ti-Raleigh) e Telekom, only one stage was recorded at the Tour of Catalonia and the Tour of Britain in 1988, one at the Tour de l’Avenir in 1989 and the Dutch semi-classic Veenendaal-Veenendaal in 1992, a bitter year for Jacques anyway. In fact, at the Tour of Switzerland, in a fall in which fatality and disorganization weighed heavily, he crashed heavily to the ground, fracturing several parts of his body. Jacques, almost 32 years old, he now seems lost to great cycling, but after a long period of rehabilitation, he returns to cycling and returns to racing in 1993right with the German Telekom, taking a few more placings. But his competitive season has in fact ended some time ago and, without leaving the German club, begins to play the role of public relations officer of the team.
Which will give him those satisfactions that they will complete a journey, in the world of cycling, traced with the sign of the unfinished.
2024-03-26 13:03:00
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