Daniël Willemsen

Daniël Johan Nico Willemsen (born 7 May 1975 in Lochem, Gelderland) is a Dutch sidecarcross rider and ten times World Champion.

Willemsen's sidecar experience started in 1981, when he and his brother Marcel, aged six and four, drove in a home-made Hond 50 cc side car, under the guidance of their father Berry, who had also been a sidecar racer.

However, it took the brothers another ten years before they were allowed to take part in sidecar races.

The two brothers entered the senior Dutch championship in 1994, but were barred from racing together in the World Championship because Marcel was not yet 18 years old and Daniël had to find a different passenger instead.

Willemsen's first World Championship race was in 1994 at the Dutch Grand Prix.

Marcel joined his brother in this competition 1995, when he was finally old enough.

After teaming up with his brother in 1995, who later became a world championship rider in his own right, his track record started to improve.

The two brothers won their first race on 12 May 1996 when they won race two in Baugé, France.

The Wiilemsens won their first Grand Prix in 1997 in Estonia.

After finishing third in 1997, suffering a bad accident at the German GP, and second in 1998, the two won their first world championship in 1999, taking it out by one point and beating the then current champions Kristers Serģis / Artis Rasmanis.

Willemsen is the most successful rider in sidecarcross history, winning the title ten times, in 1999, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2010, 2011 and 2012.

In February 2000, the two brothers had a serious accident in a training run in Italy, which saw Marcel temporarily parallised and unable to continue his career.

In his stead, for the next two seasons, Sven Verbrugge from Belgium became Daniël's partner and the two finished second in the overall standing in 2000 and 2001.

2002 saw a repeat of this result, now with Alfons Eggers as his passenger.

With Kaspars Stupelis from Latvia as his partner, he won the 2003 and 2004 world championship.

For his success in motor sport he was made a member of the Order of Orange-Nassau in 2005.

His home town Lochem also has named a street after him in 2005.

Sven Verbrugge returned for the 2005 and 2006 season and they took out two more world championships together.

In 2007, he took part in the Dakar Rally, finishing tenth in the solo motorcycle class.

In 2007, the Swiss Reto Grütter was Daniël's partner and with him he won his record sixth title.

He has also won the Dutch national sidecarcross championship nine times, winning it last in 2008 and the Belgian championship twice.

To make up for the canceled Dakar Rally 2008, he took part in the Tuareq Rally in March/April 2008, winning the race.

In the 2008 season, Willemsen again raced with Reto Grütter as his partner.

An injury prevented Grütter from taking part in the first race of the season and Willemsen replaced him with Bruno Kaelin for the first round.

In race fourteen of the season, the team was disqualified after winning the race due to Grütter losing a glove, after a protest by Kristers Serģis.

The duo won the 2008 championship convincingly, with a 97 point gap to the second-placed Kristers Serģis.

For the 2009 World Championship, Willemsen was teaming up in the first GP with Belgian passenger Dagwin Sabbe, continuing his habit of changing passengers at regular interval.

From the second event onwards, he used veteran passenger Sven Verbrugge once more.

On 5 July 2009, Willemsen broke his collar bone in a Dutch championship race, ruling him out of racing in a decisive phase of the world championship, just before the end of a summer break in the competition.

The duo missed the three following events, thereby losing the leadership in the competition.

Upon return, the team could not achieve the same dominance as before Willemsen's injury and finished only fifth in the overall standings, having to let the Belgian-Latvian team of Joris Hendrickx and Kaspars Liepiņš take out the championship.

In the last event of the season, Verbrugge broke his thumb and the team was unable to score any points.

Daniël Willemsen however declared already before the race that he would try to win title number eight in 2010, which he successfully did.

He is the most successful World Championship sidecarcross rider and his ten titles place him seventh, as of 2011, in the all-time FIM World Champions list, with Giacomo Agostini with 15 titles at the top.

In 2011, Willemsen started once more with 43-year-old Sven Verbrugge as his passenger, after an injury to first-choice passenger Roman Vasyliaka.

It is the fifth time that Willemsen and Verbrugge are racing together in the competition.

Willemsen temporarily switched to Ondrej Cermak as his passenger for the first of two German GP's because of an injury to Verbrugge.

Willemsen and his passenger clinched the World Championship at the second-last race of the season, at Slagelse, Denmark, having a 53 point lead over Latvians Jānis and Lauris Daiders at the time.

The last race event of the 2011 season saw the World Champions, Willemsen and Verbrugge, failing to score any points.

Willemsen already announced that he would aim for title number ten in 2012.