- Piet Kleine
Pieter "Piet" Kleine (born
17 september 1951 inHollandscheveld ,Drenthe ) is a former speed skater from theNetherlands .hort biography
At the
1976 Winter Olympics inInnsbruck , Piet Kleine became Olympic Champion on the 10,000 m, beating world record holderSten Stensen – who won silver – in a close race. This was a reversal of the roles in the Olympic 5,000 m (which had been held three days earlier), in which Stensen had won gold and Kleine silver. In both the 5,000 m and the 10,000 m, Dutch – later French – speed skaterHans van Helden (then world record holder on the 5,000 m) won bronze. Later that same year (1976), Kleine broke 4 worlds records (including Van Helden's 5,000 m world record) and also became World Allround Champion.Kleine participated again in the Winter Olympics of Lake Placid (1980), winning Olympic silver on the 10,000 m behind
Eric Heiden . He ended his career as a speed skater in 1981 and started a successful career in amateurbicycle racing . In 1985, as a member of the Dutch national team, he finished 5th at the World Championships on the 100 kmteam time trial .In 1986, Kleine became a marathon skater. This led to some controversy in 1997 when he finished 5th in the
Elfstedentocht , but was subsequently removed from the final list of results because of a missing stamp on his stamp card. The controversy lay in the fact that, afterwards, it became clear that in the past several winners of the Elfstedentocht had missed stamps too, but were still declared the winners.Kleine ended his skating career in 2001 and continued his profession as a postman, a profession he had always kept alongside his sports careers. In his free time, Kleine is the leader of a team of marathon skaters.
He later coached
Dan Jansen .Medals
An overview of medals won by Kleine at important championships he participated in, listing the years in which he won each:
Kleine has an
Adelskalender score of 164.899 points. His highest ranking on the Adelskalender was a 2nd place.References
* [http://www.skateresults.com/skater/show/530 Piet Kleine at SkateResults.com]
* [http://web.telia.com/~u46130641/adelm.htm Piet Kleine's ranking and personal records on the current Adelskalender]
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