It was not at all obvious that Erik would end up in the triathlon sport. As a child, he had a severe form of asthmatic bronchitis that significantly hindered his ability to exercise. However, his father was once a talented decathlete and took his kids to the athletics track. There, Erik surprisingly showed talent for middle-distance running.


He outgrew the illness and at eighteen he even managed to reach a national championship final in the A-juniors for the 5,000 meters. We are talking late 1980s and triathlon is on the rise. Again, his father proved to be a catalyst for his love of multisports: they competed together twice in the Holten quarter triathlon (1988 and 1989), and in 1989 Erik as a junior finished second overall at the triathlon in Hengelo.

"Then my study period started and my focus shifted to other things. The love for the sport turned into a love for the pub, which in hindsight was a pity... but I had a great time," Erik looks back without regret on that period. During that time, he also worked as a techno and acid DJ behind the decks at various large festivals and clubs. In terms of sports, he switched to volleyball.

 
"Volleyball was great fun, but at 1.82 meters I was a bit short to play at a higher level. When I lowered my volleyball activity after my thirties and my clothes started to get tighter, I had a reality check on the scale: I weighed almost a hundred kilos by then."


That was in 2007 and the then mid-thirty-year-old decided to change course. Losing weight by consistently running and cycling again. After a year of intense training and over twenty kilos lighter, the reward was an entry for the Twente Triathlon Tour. "I couldn't swim at all, after four laps I was gasping at the pool edge. But I was hooked, what an awesome sport!"
A holiday to Lanzarote sparked the ambition to complete a full triathlon on that island once. And then the triathlon virus hit for good: the tally now stands at six completed full triathlons and twenty halves. Erik tries to combine this with family life with three sporty young children, so he has set himself a limit of a maximum of ten training hours per week.