[CR]Whatever happened to Tiemen Groen?

(Example: Framebuilding:Technology)

Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 08:42:26 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Brian Booth" <swiftybjb@yahoo.com>
To: Classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
Subject: [CR]Whatever happened to Tiemen Groen?

Seeing the recent Pic of the Day of Tiemen Groen reminded me of seeing him when he was World Amateur Pursuit Champion at a Wheelers Meet at Fallowfield in Manchester in the mid 60's (he was a 4 time champion, 3 amateur and 1 pro).

He was a sight to behold, a big guy who dwarfed everyone else, with tons of power, probably similar to Ullrich, as Paul Sherwin likes to put it "a big diesel engine".

Groen easily won the pursuit at the Wheelers Meet, but in the 10 mile race Eric Thompson stuck to his wheel like he was glued to it, no matter where Groen went, up the banking, down the banking, to the front, mid pack, whatever, Thompson would not leave his wheel, thinking no doubt that Groen would break away and give him a free ride to the finish where he could use his sprint to get the win.

Well Groen got tired of everyone waiting for him to make his move and following him everywhere and just sat up with about 5 laps to go (with Thompson still on his wheel), some other riders broke away and by the time Thompson realized Groen was not going to chase, it was too late and the race was over.

Groen was a total class act, perfection on the bike, and I often wondered over the years whatever happened to him, 4 years at the top and then he was gone (or so it seemed). Does anyone know what happened to him?

Brian Booth Toronto, Canada

__________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com