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**Karsten Kroon**
Personal information
Full name	Karsten Kroon
Date of birth	January 29, 1976 (age 33)
Country	Netherlands
Height	1.80 m
Weight	67 kg
Team information
Current team	Team Saxo Bank
Discipline	Road
Role	Rider
Rider type	Classics Rider
Amateur team(s)1
	AGU
Professional team(s)1
1997–2005; 2006–2009; 2010–	Rabobank; Team CSC; BMC Racing Team
Major wins
	Tour de France, 1 stage; GP Kanton Aargau, 2001; Rund um den Henninger Turm, 2004, 2008
	Infobox last updated on:
	January 15, 2007 1 Team names given are those prevailing; at time of rider beginning association with that team.

Karsten Kroon (born January 29 1976 in Dalen) is a Dutch professional road bicycle racer who currently rides for Team Saxo Bank in the UCI ProTour bicycling series.

[edit] Career

As an amateur rider, Kroon showed his talent by winning the professional race of Ronde van Drenthe in 1996. He was then brought into the youth squad of Holland based team Rabobank in 1997, where Kroon won a number of amateur races in two years. In 1999, he moved to the senior squad of Rabobank, where he rode until 2005. He gathered but a handful of wins in his six years at Rabobank, most notably stage 8, on Bastille Day, of the 2002 Tour de France. Kroon and his Rabobank team mate Erik Dekker approached the finish in a seven man group, and with the help of the more experienced Dekker, Kroon won a stage win in his first ever Tour de France participation.^[1] During his time at the Rabobank team, Karsten Kroon at some point lead the mountain jersey competition in each of the three Grand Tours, though his lead didn't hold to the end in any of the races.

On August 10, 2005 it was announced that he, until 2007, was to ride for Team CSC, now known as Team Saxo Bank. Kroon wanted more freedom in his racing. "I've never said that I want to be leader," he told CyclingNews.com, "I only want to get chances".^[2] In the March and April races of 2006, Kroon was the joint team captain in a number of ProTour races. He finished in the top ten of Tirreno-Adriatico and Ronde van Vlaanderen. His most noticeable work would still be as a helper, as he helped his team mate Fränk Schleck win the Amstel Gold Race. When Schleck attacked the front group, Kroon successfully disrupted the efforts of the riders trying to pull Schleck back in, and finished himself as number four.^[3] In La Flèche Wallonne, Kroon finally finished on the podium himself, as the third placed rider just in front of Schleck. He finished on the podium of the 2009 Amstel Gold Race, just behind Serguei Ivanov.