Leontien van Moorsel

Leontien van Moorsel

Van Moorsel in 1991
Personal information
Full name	Leontien Martha Henrica Petronella Zijlaard-van Moorsel
Born	(1970-03-22) 22 March 1970 (age 46) Boekel, Netherlands
Team information
Discipline	Road & track
Role	Rider
Medal record Representing the  Netherlands Road bicycle racing Olympic Games 2000 Sydney Road race 2000 Sydney Time trial 2004 Athens Time trial World Championships 1991 Stuttgart Road race 1993 Oslo Road race 1998 Valkenburg Time trial 1999 Verona Time trial 1998 Valkenburg Road race Track cycling Olympic Games 2000 Sydney Individual pursuit 2000 Sydney Points race 2004 Athens Individual pursuit World Championships 1990 Maebashi City Individual pursuit 2001 Antwerp Individual pursuit 2002 Copenhagen Individual pursuit 2003 Stuttgart Individual pursuit 1998 Bordeaux Individual pursuit

Leontien Martha Henrica Petronella Zijlaard-van Moorsel (born 22 March 1970) is a Dutch retired racing cyclist. She rode at three Olympic Games.

Van Moorsel started her career in 1977. She won major races both on the track, and on the road. In the first half of the 1990s, she won the Tour Féminin twice, after fierce competition with Jeannie Longo.

Van Moorsel dropped out of cycling in 1994 with anorexia nervosa but recovered to compete at the World Championships in 1998, winning the time trial and coming second in the road race.

At the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, van Moorsel won gold medals on the road (road race and time trial), and on the track (3 km pursuit). At the 2004 Summer Olympics, she fell in the penultimate lap of the road race, but successfully defended her time trial title.

Her four gold medals tie her (with four others) for the most ever by a Dutch athlete at the Olympics.

She set a new world hour record for women of 46.065 km, in 2003 in Mexico City, which was not improved upon for almost 12 years, when UCI rule changes prompted a new succession of attempts.

Van Moorsel retired from professional cycling after the 2004 Olympics.

Van Moorsel married former track cyclist Michael Zijlaard in October 1995. They have a daughter.

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