Ina Teutenberg’s cycling dream team

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Ina Teutenberg (gallery) - Women's Week(Image credit: Tim de Waele/TDWSport.com)

In a run of features, Cyclingnews sits down with some of the sport's well-known personalities as they pick their cycling dream teams. It's Women's Week on Cyclingnews that is held in conjunction with the launch of our brand new dedicated women's page. This week, the legendary Ina Teutenberg selects her dream team.

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Judith can do everything. I used to race on the track with her and then we went into road racing. She was one of the top-three best women riders in the world for the last 10 years of her career. She was absolutely consistent, always there, always there for her teammates, and most of the time she was the person who got the result for the team in every hard race. There is no doubt about her being one of the all-time favourites. She is also a nice person, we have known each other for a long time, so we were young and crazy, and then we got older and less crazy. We had a great working relationship and there was a blind understanding between us during races. There were never any words exchanged between us, we just knew what the other was thinking during a race. She was able to do everything within a race, except for field sprinting. She was a worker, a GC rider and a classics rider. Looking at her results you would see that she has done it all.

She was the best sprinter ever. We were good teammates. I learned my trade from her. She was there at the finishes and I could always hide behind her as a young sprinter and learn what it meant to lead a team, and what it meant to take the responsibility in the sprint. It was really important for me at the start of my career, not having pressure on me, and just being able to hide behind her and learn, work for her and also lead her out. I learned everything from her tactics-wise. She was just a great teammate and won so many bike races. We used to be really good friends but since we are both not racing anymore we’ve gone our separate ways a little bit. She took me under her wing when I was young and I stayed with her for training camps. We had a good friendship.

Back in the day we didn’t have as many Classics like the women have now. If Anna was racing at this time in our sport, she would win most of the Classics. She was a great one-day rider, won the World Cup title twice, was a great GC rider for shorter stage races. She was the number one in the world for years at that time, a really good teammate, good leader, led by example, could work for others and got big results for the team. She was the Tom Boonen of women’s racing, except better because she could also win GC races.

She was the best teammate ever, a great worker and always there for everyone. She was always there for the riders who had to get results for the team. She was always holding herself back for the result of the team. Everyone could rely on her. She never had a bad day, always did her work, was always there at the end. She won a couple of races and I think she could have won more. She helped the team be a better team. Kim was always a huge part of all of our results. She was the comedian at the table and always kept everyone smiling.

Chantal was a really good teammate. She won a couple of really big races and you could always count on her to get a really good result by sneaking away. She was also a great lead-out person. She was so tall that I never saw anything from behind her but her legs, but you could always trust her 100 per cent to bring you to the line and in the right position. She was always very professional, always in a good mood, there for all the riders and never scared to speak up. She always made the team better.

She came on to my team as a youngster, always as strong as a bull, even as a younger person, too. She was there and she was good but not as good as she is now. It was so much fun to watch her grow as a rider, and to help her a little bit along the way. She was one of the most important parts of the team time trial. She was a great lead-out person, and like Chantal, she is so tall that I never saw anything from behind her, but I trusted her and would just hold on to her wheel. She was my roommate a lot in the last two years of my career and we got a long really well. She was honest, it sometimes hurt, but she was very honest. She is a great bike rider and it has been so good to see how she’s developed the last few years, getting better and better every year. She always had it in her but it took a while to get it out of her.

Her story is remarkable. She is such a fighter. She came on the team with no experience. You told her what to do and she would fucking ride in front of an elite women’s field for 75km and win the race. We all fight for our places but Evie is just like, ‘never say never.’ She was so inspirational at times, to the point where I would say, ‘how the fuck did she just do that?’ She has a good character, is a great person to have on a team, and makes everyone smile. It was good to be part of her early career, too, and watch her grow and get better. I still have a lot of contact with her. In the first race we ever did together, she crashed me, but she was too scared to tell me. Somebody else told me that it was her and I had to ask her about it at training camp. It was pretty funny, actually.

We only rode together for one year, so I don’t have huge experience with her as a teammate but we rode on the national team together, too. I’ve seen her ride on other teams. In 2012, I could rely on her 100 per cent. Judith had left that year and Trixi took over that role. She is one of these great teammates, leads by example, she also knows a lot and so is always in the right place at the right time. In Dutch races and in echelons, she was there. She wins a lot of stage races, so she’s great for a team. She’s won more in the last two years than before. She always helps others around her to be better.

I’m the sprinter … and the bitch of the team. I put the young ones in order and they hate me at times but they appreciate me, too. After Petra left, I took over the sprinter's role. We have a couple of decades of riders on this dream team and it’s never a bad idea to have two good sprinters. I’m also a good Classics rider. I always liked going in breakaways, which took pressure off, to try to win that way. I also liked to work for my teammates, too. To be honest, I hated bunch sprinting even though I was good at it. It’s dangerous and scary. I was good at it, and it’s great when you win, but it’s scary at times.