Steven Kruijswijk

In 2007 Kruijswijk began riding for the Rabobank Continental Team. In 2009 he won the Under 23 category of the Dutch National Road Race Championships.

In 2011, Kruijswijk finished 8th overall in the Giro d'Italia and won Stage 6 in the Tour de Suisse, finishing third overall.[8] His second career victory came at the Arctic Race of Norway in 2014.

Kruijswijk (left), wearing the maglia azzurra of mountains classification leader, at the 2015 Giro d'Italia

In 2015, Kruijswijk led LottoNL–Jumbo at the Giro d'Italia. Although he lost time in the first week, Kruijswijk rode a strong second half of the race, finishing second to Mikel Landa on stage 16, the queen stage of the race. He eventually finished seventh overall, 10 minutes and 53 seconds down on Alberto Contador.[9] Kruijswijk held the blue jersey as leader of the mountains classification from stages 16 to 18, and placed third in that competition behind Giovanni Visconti and Landa.[10] With his efforts in the second half of the race, Kruijswijk was praised by many as the next general classification rider from the Netherlands. Kruijswijk took his form into the Tour de France where he helped teammate Robert Gesink finish in 6th place overall. Kruijswijk was also active himself on mountain stages by going into breakaways, however he had no luck of winning a stage.

Kruijswijk, wearing the maglia rosa of general classification leader, at the 2016 Giro d'Italia

In 2016, Kruijswijk rode the Giro d'Italia again, which began with three stages in the Netherlands. On the queen stage of the race, stage 14, Kruijswijk finished second behind Esteban Chaves (Orica–GreenEDGE) to take the overall lead by 41 seconds over Vincenzo Nibali (Astana).[11] On stage 15, a mountainous time trial finishing on the Seiser Alm, Kruijswijk again finished second, this time to Alexander Foliforov (Gazprom–RusVelo) to increase his lead to 2 minutes and 12 seconds over Chaves, as Nibali encountered mechanical issues, and dropped to third overall, 2 minutes 51 seconds behind Kruijswijk.[12] Stage 16 saw Kruijswijk finish second for the third stage in a row, behind Alejandro Valverde (Movistar Team) and he increased his lead over Chaves to 3 minutes.[13] However, on stage 19 Kruijswijk crashed on the descent of the Colle dell'Agnello whilst following an attack by Nibali and Chaves, landing on a bank of snow on the side of the road. Although he was able to continue, Kruijswijk finished the stage almost five minutes down on Nibali and more than four minutes behind Chaves, thus dropping to third overall.[14] He visited the hospital after the stage where it was confirmed he had broken 2 ribs in the crash.[15] Nonetheless, he started stage 20 where he lost further time and dropped behind Valverde to fourth overall,[16] where he finished the Giro.[17]

In July, Kruijswijk signed a two-year contract extension with the team.[18] Following the disappointment of just missing out on the Giro win, Kruijswijk started the Vuelta a España, aiming to ride a good general classification in the race. He abandoned the race in the first week after a heavy crash.[19]

Kruiswijk at the 2017 Giro d'Italia

Kruijswijk aimed to win the 100th edition of the Giro d'Italia in 2017, after just missing out on the race win in 2016. His best result before the Giro was 7th overall at the Volta a Catalunya. He never reached his form from the previous year in the Giro however, and Kruijswijk abandoned the race in the last days due to illness. He quickly recovered at the Tour de Suisse, and reached the podium with 3rd overall. He was looking to redeem himself at the Vuelta a España where he was the team leader for LottoNL–Jumbo. Kruijswijk never reached the form he had the previous year and only broke inside the top 10 on the final days; with a 7th place on the finish to Alto de l'Angliru, Kruijswijk finished 9th overall in the race.

Kruijswijk during stage 12 of the 2018 Tour de France

For the 2018 season, Kruijswijk's target was on the Tour de France together with co-captain Primož Roglič. At his final preparation race for the Tour de France, Kruijswijk reached 8th position at the Tour de Suisse. When arriving at the Tour de France, Kruijswijk had a decent start and only lost time on the stage 3 team time trial. When the race entered the mountains, Kruijswijk attacked on stage 12, and entered the breakaway. He attacked solo with 80 kilometres (50 miles) to go before getting caught 5 kilometres (3.1 miles) from the finish line on Alpe d'Huez. He still managed to fight for a top ten finish on the stage, and for his effort, Kruijswijk received the combativity award on stage 12. This also put him in good position to compete for a top 10 finish for the general classification, entering the third week in the high mountains of the Pyrenees. Kruijswijk stayed with the elite riders through the final week and rode a decent individual time trial on stage 20 to finish 5th overall.

Following his strong Tour de France campaign it was decided that Kruijswijk would ride Clásica de San Sebastián as one of the team leaders. Kruijswijk finished the race in 9th place with teammates Robert Gesink and Antwan Tolhoek taking 8th and 10th places respectively. Going into his second Grand Tour of the year, the Vuelta a España, Kruijswijk was awarded the role of team leader alongside George Bennett. With a strong performance in the first week it was then decided that LottoNL–Jumbo would ride 100% in pursuit of a podium with Kruijswijk. He entered the top 5 on stage 14 after an attack on the final climb of the stage. He finished fourth on the stage 16 individual time trial, advancing to 3rd place overall. On the following day however, Kruijswijk had a bad day on the steep climb to Balcón de Bizkaia, and dropped to 5th place overall. On the penultimate stage Kruijswijk once again entered the top 3 when he finished 3rd on stage 19. When three of his contenders for the podium rode away on the second last climb of the day, Kruijswijk hesitated and lost his podium place as he had to ride the final of the last climb at his own pace. He finished in 4th place overall.