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Dennis Menchov

Denis Menchov
Denis Menchov TR 2011.jpg
Menchov at the 2011 Tour de Romandie
Personal information
Full name Denis Nikolayevich Menchov
Nickname The Silent Assassin
The Pope
Denny
Born (1978-01-25) 25 January 1978 (age 39)
Oryol, Soviet Union
Height 1.80 m (5 ft 11 in)
Weight 65 kg (143 lb; 10.2 st)
Team information
Current team Retired
Discipline Road
Role Rider
Rider type All-rounder
Professional team(s)
2000–2004 Banesto
2005–2010 Rabobank
2011 Geox–TMC
2012–2013 Team Katusha
Major wins

Grand Tours

Tour de France
Young rider classification (2003)
1 individual stage
Giro d'Italia
General classification (2009)
Points classification (2009)
2 individual stages
Vuelta a España
General classification (2007)
Mountains classification (2007)
Combination classification (2005, 2007)
5 individual stages

Stage races

Tour of the Basque Country (2004)

One-day races and Classics

National Time Trial Championships (2012)

Grand Tours

Stage races

One-day races and Classics

Denis Nikolayevich Menchov (Russian: Денис Николаевич Меньшов MEN-shov; born 25 January 1978) is a former professional Russian road bicycle racer, who rode as a professional between 2000 and 2013. He was best known as a general classification rider, a climber, and a very good time trialist. In 2005 he won the Vuelta a España, which he won for a second time in 2007. Menchov also won the centenary Giro d'Italia in 2009, and finished second in the Tour de France in 2010 becoming the first Russian to do so. He was later disqualified from this Tour de France, along with the 2009 and 2012 editions, due to adverse biological passport findings.

Born in Oryol, Menchov started his professional career in 2000 with the Banesto team of José Miguel Echevarri. His first success came in 2001, when he won the Tour de l'Avenir, a stage race for young professionals. A year later he won a stage in the Dauphiné Liberé. In 2003, Menchov had his breakthrough when he finished 11th in the Tour de France, and won the youth competition (maillot blanc). 2004 was his last year at Banesto and his most successful. He won Tour of the Basque Country, a stage in Vuelta a Aragón, a stage in Paris–Nice and stage five in the 2004 Vuelta a España, from Zaragoza to Morella.


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Wikipedia

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