Dutch sprinter Arvid de Kleijn has revealed he was assaulted by a group of teenagers whilst on a training ride last month, leaving him unconscious and with a broken nose.
The 32-year-old Tudor Pro Cycling rider was training near the Brabant town of St. Oedenrode in the south of the Netherlands when a group of teenagers started hurling abuse at him, including referring to the terminal cancer that killed his father earlier in the year, De Kleijn told Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf and his own team website. It’s not clear what specific language was used.
De Kleijn chose to turn around and “tried to start a conversation” with the teenagers. “Why did they have to swear with that word and why did they rant in the first place? When I asked if they wanted to stop, because my father died of that disease, it went from bad to worse.
“They had probably been drinking and maybe more than that. There was really no conversation to be had with them and when I decided to cycle away, they started grabbing me. Then one of them on my right suddenly lashed out and knocked me out. In the end, my nose turned out to be broken.
The assault rounds out a turbulent 15 months for the sprinter, who has won a stage at Paris-Nice and the prestigious Milan-Torino classic. At the UAE Tour last year, De Kleijn broke his collarbone in three places, requiring an extended period of rehabilitation and “heavy painkillers” after the bone splinters came looses and required further surgery. He returned to racing in the autumn and won stages at the Tour of Langkawi but was unable to raise both arms in celebration.
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His father Cees also received his cancer diagnosis last year, but beat initial prognoses to survive into the new year, meaning he got to witness the birth of De Kleijn’s first child with his wife, Céline, in January, before he passed away in February. Complications following the birth also meant De Kleijn missed a winter training camp, with the team’s blessing, to care for his wife and daughter.
“My dad had been battling cancer, and toward the end, things became very difficult for him and for all of us as a family. I needed to be there. I needed to stay close.”
“[The birth] was beautiful news, of course. But becoming a father while preparing to lose my own dad… that was emotionally overwhelming. I was living between two extremes: joy and heartbreak at the exact same time.”
Despite the emotional intensity of the winter, De Kleijn is grateful his father’s death was not painful or drawn out, noting “you don’t want it all to last that last period, because then the process of suffering is long and intense. The way it has gone now, everyone in the family has given peace and we all look back on a beautiful farewell.”
After a difficult winter, De Kleijn will race for the first time this year at the one-day Rund um Köln on Sunday. He is hungry to deliver results on his return, saying he wants “to win again, for myself, for the team, and for everyone who stood by me during this period.” But the assault has left him pessimistic about the future generation, adding “It is especially sad that you often see that this [younger] generation no longer has respect for fellow human beings.”
10 thoughts on “Pro cyclist left unconscious with broken nose after being beaten up by teenagers during training ride”
> hurling abuse at him, including referring to the terminal cancer that killed his father
Some useful context, “cancer” is a very common word used in insults in Dutch, basically used as an adjective with other words. E.g., “kanker lul” -> cancer dick, “kanker wijf” -> cancer wife (where wife in this context has some connotations akin to ‘bitch’ in this context, one to aim at women), “krijg de kanker” -> hope you get cancer, etc., etc.
It is unlikely these kids had any inkling his dad had died of cancer, until he told them to stop because of that reason.
Oh, other illnesses may be used too instead of cancer. E.g., typhus is another commonly used one, for some reason.
And yes, if you’ve had some tragedy related to such an illness, it must be really jarring and upsetting to hear those insults (even if they are the most common insults in Dutch). I never could understand how these insults came about, how people thought they were good insults, or how they are commonly tolerated. Lack of imagination.
A pox on them all.
@rookybiker Pox “pokken” also features in dutch insults. 😉 Though, less commonly than cancer, typhus and tubercolis, I would say.
Seems wikipedia has a decent article on dutch insults: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_profanity
@rookybiker Pox “pokken” also features in dutch insults. 😉 Though, less commonly than cancer, typhus and tubercolis, I would say.
Seems wikipedia has a decent article on dutch insults. Feel free to search for it – if I link to it my comment gets blackholed in moderation.
@Paul J That is interesting context – so they weren’t callous enough to have deliberately picked on his father’s death, just enough to insult him generically and then knock him out for remonstrating.
What are the UCI bureaucrats doing to make pro cycling really safer during races and training rides? Between murderous motorists, violent muggers and inconsequential idiots, pro cycling has become a hazardous activity.
@MaxiMinimalist How is this anything to do with the UCI. Jurisdiction is with the Dutch Police, and the societal actions with Dutch politicians, not a sports body.
@MaxiMinimalist Fingers crossed this is supposed to be ironic, but going by your palmares it probably is every bit as stupid as it sounds.
Are you the village idiot? (Asking for a friend)