Leopold König

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Leopold König

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Leopold König
Personal information
König at the 2014 Tour of Britain
Full name	Leopold König
Born	(1987-11-15) 15 November 1987 (age 37) Moravská Třebová, Czechoslovakia
Height	1.78 m (5 ft 10 in)
Weight	62 kg (137 lb)
Team information
Current team	Retired
Discipline	Road
Role	Rider
Rider type	All-rounder
Professional teams
2006–2010	PSK Whirlpool–Hradec Krlove
2011–2014	Team NetApp
2015–2016	Team Sky
2017–2019	Bora–Hansgrohe^[1]

Major wins
Grand Tours Vuelta a España 1 individual stage (2013) 1 TTT stage (2016) One-day races and Classics National Time Trial Championships (2016)

Leopold König (born 15 November 1987) is a Czech former professional road cyclist, who rode professionally between 2006 and 2019 for the PSK Whirlpool–Author, NetApp–Endura, Team Sky and Bora–Hansgrohe teams. Since retiring, he has acted as the race director for the Czech Cycling Tour and the Course de la Paix U23 – Grand Prix Jeseníky.^[2]^[3]

Career

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Early career

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Born in the small Czech town of Moravská Třebová, 100 miles (160 kilometres) east of Prague, König as a child played ice hockey, using his bike solely for fitness until he started road racing at the age of 14.^[4]

Team NetApp (2011–2014)

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König was a stage winner in Caerphilly in September 2012 at the Tour of Britain and in May 2013, he won the queen stage of the Tour of California finishing atop Mount Diablo. König detached himself from a small group in the final kilometers and caught Janier Acevedo, dropping him with only 300 m (980 ft) to go.^[5]

However both these wins were eclipsed in August 2013 when he claimed his team's maiden Grand Tour victory by winning a mountain stage to Alto Peñas Blancas in the Vuelta a España after catching climber Igor Antón in the final 500 metres.

König took part in his first Tour de France in 2014, finishing seventh overall after rising two places from ninth by placing fifth in the final time trial.

Team Sky (2015–2016)

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König signed for Team Sky for the 2015 season.^[6] König achieved his first podium place for the team, scoring third place at the Trofeo Serra de Tramuntana.^[7] In the Giro d'Italia, he took over the leadership role as his leader Richie Porte suffered a massive loss of time and ultimately withdrew.^[8] On Stage 16 featuring the Mortirolo Pass, König was docked 10 seconds for holding onto cars.^[9] König performed well in the final stages but not well enough to secure a top 5 finish, finishing 6th overall.

Bora–Hansgrohe (2017–2019)

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After two years with Team Sky, König returned to his former team – now known as Bora–Hansgrohe – on a three-year contract.^[10] In the first half of the 2017 season, König only competed in two races due to injury.^[11] Following his injury-related withdrawal from the 2018 Tirreno–Adriatico, Konig did not race again for the team over the remaining 21 months of his contract, and had no interaction with his Bora–Hansgrohe teammates.^[12]