Danny Nelissen

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Daniel ("Danny") Wilhelmus Maria Nelissen (born 10 November 1970 in Sittard, Netherlands) is a Dutch former professional road bicycle racer and current sports commentator at Eurosport. He most famously rode for the Dutch cycling team of Rabobank. He won the 1995 Amateur World Championship of cycling, and was subsequently named as Dutch Sportsman of the year.

He started his professional career in 1990 with the PDM-team for whom he won his first professional race, the Grand Prix de Wallonie, in 1992. In 1994, while riding for the Dutch TVM team, he got for first signs of heart rhythm impairments and returned to ride at the amateur level. The following year he experienced the greatest success in his career; in Colombia he won the Amateur World Championship of road racing. He was the last world champion in the amateur category, as the governing body of cycling, UCI, replaced it with a youth competition in 1996. The triumph lead to Nelissen's election as 1995 Dutch Sportsman of the year. He was brought into the Rabobank team where he would ride for two years under team manager Jan Raas. In the 1996 Tour de France, he wore the polka dot jersey of the strongest rider in the mountains for a couple of days. Before the 1998 season, he joined the Danish team, Team Home - Jack & Jones (now named Team CSC). In January 1999, Nelissen experienced further problems with his heart, and after medical consultation he retired from bicycle racing at age 28.^[1]