WICKLOW’S JUUL
Bike ace has blossomed into one of Denmark’s finest since his days cycling the roads around Kilmacanogue
IN A SENSE, Chris Juul-Jensen is coming home this week. He has raced under the Danish flag since his midteens, and reckons it has been three years since he’s been Ireland, but it was under the shadow of the Sugar Loaf that his dream of becoming a professional cyclist took hold.
It was on Irish roads that Juul-Jensen showed the initial signs of promise that was then nurtured in the advanced Danish system. And it’s back on Irish roads where he will make his Grand Tour debut, as part of Nicolas Roche’s TinkoffSaxo team, when the Giro d’Italia gets underway in Belfast this week.
‘It’s funny how things work out,’ the 23year-old told the Irish Mail on Sunday on Wednesday afternoon, moments after the snow-affected first stage of Tour de Romandie. ‘It’s my first Grand Tour as a pro, and it’s starting in Ireland. I haven’t been back in a few years and I won’t have time to catch up but I’m so excited to be back on the roads, back cycling around Dublin.’
He had just turned nine and was obsessed with cycling when the Tour de France came to these shores in 1998. Even though the memories are seen through the prism of childhood, that summer is crystal-clear in his mind.
Denmark’s finest, Bjarne Riis was standing at the summit of the cycling world back then (he had won the Tour De France in 1996), so there was great excitement in the Juul-Jensen household in the days before the Tour arrived.
The whole family left their Co Wicklow home in Kilmacanogue and headed into their father’s city centre office, where, away from the crowds and the rain, they had the perfect place to see Chris Boardman presented with the yellow jersey.
‘We were all in Dad’s office when the time trial went through Dublin,’ recalls Juul-Jensen. ‘I remember it well. The next day, the race was coming through Wicklow, Kilmacanogue actually, that was even more exciting,’ he recalls. It caused tension, though. While his father, Knud and older brother Tomas, went traipsing through the Wicklow mountains to watch the peleton go through the Sally Gap, Chris had to stay at home.
‘Dad and Tomas went off with the local cycling club, but I was too young to head up the mountains so I had to stay at home. I was a bit p****d off, there might have been a tantrum at home,’ Juul-Jensen chuckles now with a south Dublin accent that seven years living in Denmark has done little to penetrate.
But I went down the lane beside our house, with my mother and a few neighbours, because they were almost coming by our house. Where we were was the point where most of the cyclists decided to stop to take a leak, which was funny.’ Ireland’s first experience of the Grand Tour was tarnished by the Festina affair and was infamously dubbed the ‘Tour De Dopage.’ And while it has taken the sport itself some time to wipe clean those stains, its other legacy was that it nourished the dreams of Jensen and 14-yearold Philip Deignan, who will be on Team Sky this week. Within a couple of years, Juul-Jensen was already showing his potential at his local Sorrento cycling club.
‘At the time, myself and Tomas were the only two youth cyclists at the club. It’s not like now, when there is a boom in junior cycling in Ireland.’
Perhaps, it was the Danish blood coursing through his veins that stirred his passion for cycling. Denmark prides itself on being the most cycling-friendly country in Europe and it was from Aarhus, the country’s second city, y, that Juul-Jensen’s parents came to Ireland land in the 1980s when his father, Knud, was transferred by the shipping company any for which he worked. They stayed for almost 20 years. ‘They fell in love with the place,’ e,’ he explains. ‘ Especially Wicklow. My parents set up their own import/export business, eventually.’
It was Juul-Jensen’s promise as a cyclist that took the family back to Denmark. By the time he was 15, he was already one of the top junior riders around and had represented Ireland in the 2005 World Youth Olympics. Having done his Junior Cert, though, he followed the path of his older brother, Tomas, and spent transition year in Aarhus. His potential had been spotted and he was approached to join the Danish cycling system.
‘In the Danish school system, if you are sho showing promise as a cyclist, you are dev developed in a combination of education and cycling. The sport is actually a class in your y timetable. If I wanted to develop to be b the best cyclist I could be, Denmark wa was where I needed to be.’
After A convincing his parents to allow him to go to cycling school for the rest of his secondary education, the family pac packed up their lives in Wicklow and also mo moved back.
If he had stayed in Ireland for his secondary on education, he would have had completed co his Leaving Cert by 18. In the t Danish system, his school years were extended to 20 – to accommodate his academic and athletic development. ‘In Ireland, I would have had spent too much time studying for my Leaving cert. That’s why a lot of junior cyclists neglect the bike and even pack it in around 17 or 18. In Denmark, they give you more time, encourage you to bal- ance your sport and education.
It’s yielding benefits now. The three years in the Danish system allowed him to develop a ‘mature riding mentality’.
At the age of 20, he finished 17th in the Tour of Denmark. It opened the door to Riis and the Saxo team. And after a couple of seasons racing in smaller races, polishing off his rough edges, he has spent this spring, developing in the role of domestique for Tinkoff-Saxo.
AND THAT’S role he will fulfil when back on Irish roads in the next few days. But you won’t hear any complaints from Juul-Jensen. Having left home at 16 to follow his dream in a different country, he is well aware that he has to play the long game in the sport.
‘It’s a vital role. Nicolas is going to be the team leader in the Giro, so it is up to me to be his shadow and make sure he doesn’t get into any trouble. Those who have only a passing interest in cycling probably don’t understand the role too much, but it is vital in your development. Part of the learning curve, especially in your first Grand Tour.
‘And to be competing in my first Grand Tour in Ireland is going to be a bit special. It was something I would have dreamed about back when the Tour de France came to Ireland.’
Who knows? Being on the start-line in Belfast might even make up for not being allowed to watch the peleton come through the Wicklow mountains all those years ago.