Theo Middelkamp

Theofiel Middelkamp (23 February 1914 – 2 May 2005) was a Dutch road cyclist. In 1947, Middelkamp became world champion. In 1936, he was the first Dutch cyclist ever to win a stage in the Tour de France.

Biography Middelkamp was born as the second son in a family of nine children. At an early age, he wanted to be a footballer, but he soon realised that there was much more money to be earned in cycling, as football was not yet a professional sport in the Netherlands.

Middelkamp was the first Dutchman to win a stage in the Tour de France. When he came to the Tour, he had never even seen mountains, coming from the very flat parts of the Netherlands. However, in his first Tour, on 14 July 1936, he won the difficult mountain stage from Aix-les-Bains to Grenoble, which went over the Col du Galibier. That year, he finished 23rd overall. In 1937 he had to quit the Tour because of a fall, in which he broke a finger.

In 1938 he won the seventh stage (Bayonne-Pau). In that tour, he won 8,000 francs, much less than he could have earned in races in Flanders, and so he decided not to participate in any later Tours. As Middelkamp famously said, "I cannot live on fame and honour".

During the Second World War, Middelkamp earned money by smuggling, but he was caught and spent several months in prison. After the war, he went back to full-time cycling.

In 1947, Middelkamp became the first Dutch world champion on the road, in Reims, after having been close to that title in the previous year.

Middelkamp ended his career in 1951, when he bought a pub in Kieldrecht. For a long time, he would not talk to journalists about his cycling years, until he spoke about his famous 1936 stage win in a television program in 2003. Middelkamp died in 2005.

Major results

1935 5th Kampioenschap van Vlaanderen 1936 1st GP Stad Vilvoorde 1st Stage 7 Tour de France

1938

1st Stage 7 Tour de France 1943

1944 2nd Grand Prix Jules Lowie 3rd Road race, National Road Championships 1945

1st Nationale Sluitingsprijs 10th Circuit des Onze Villes 1946 2nd Road race, National Road Championships 10th Scheldeprijs 1947

3rd Scheldeprijs 1948 1st GP Stad Vilvoorde 3rd Road race, National Road Championships 3rd Scheldeprijs 1950

10th Overall Ronde van Nederland

Grand Tour general classification results timeline

+ Legend — Did not compete DNF Did not finish