Annemiek van Vleuten Will End Her Massive Career This Week at the Simac Ladies Tour
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Movistar superstar Annemiek van Vleuten, 40, will hang up her wheels at the end of this year’s Simac Ladies Tour, the Dutch stage race in her home nation. The race runs from September 5-10, and includes many of van Vleuten’s longtime training routes.
As she comes to the end of her racing career, van Vleuten can’t help but reflect on how far she’s come, what she’s endured, and where the sport is headed. She started racing in 2007, with small crits and one-day races. She found success early, and quit her office job in 2010 to become a full time professional cyclist.
She went on to have numerous major wins, such as the UCI Women’s Road World Championships, the women’s Tour of Flanders, the GP de Plouay–Bretagne, and Open de Suède Vårgårda. She also represented the Netherlands at the 2012 Summer Olympics.
Van Vleuten has only continued to dominate women’s cycling in the Grand Tours—she won the Giro Donne in 2017, 2018, 2019, 2022, and 2023. She also won last year’s inaugural Tour de France Femmes, and La Vuelta Femenina for the past three years. She was the first woman to complete a Giro–Tour double in the same year.
But despite the highs, van Vleuten has been honest about the lows. In an interview with NOS, van Vleuten said that she often endured unnatural weight requirements. “For the Tour, I have to find a bit of an unnatural weight. It is still healthy, but it is not my balanced weight. I have to focus very much on it, weigh everything, to reach the weight with which I want to go to the Tour to win.”
Van Vleuten also said that she’s seen the same in her male colleagues. “It’s a very difficult balance.” Van Vleuten said that she doesn’t feel she’s ever crossed the line into overtraining or being too lean, but that she’s often been very aware of the line.
Cycling News reported that van Vleuten hasn’t officially announced plans for post-retirement, but that she will almost certainly stay busy. “I see myself more as an entrepreneur or someone who can be hired—something in sports, which is my passion. I don’t want to be a team leader, because then you get stuck in the same life. You stay away from home a lot; you go to the same hotels...that appeals to me less.”
The Dutch phenom has enjoyed all of the travel she’s gotten to do through training camps and races, but she’s looking forward to more freedom with her schedule. With four more days of racing left in her career, the cycling world will certainly miss her, but will also look forward to seeing what’s next.
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