Now into her third year with Team DSM, Esmée has continued to make steps year-on-year, growing both as a rider and a person. 2022 saw Esmée’s level develop even further, with rides in a strong support role helping the team to ten wins, while she also took some solid results herself too, such as third in the Baloise Ladies Tour prologue and 11th place on GC at the same race, plus 11th overall at the Tour of Scandinavia.
Coming into the sport later in life, Esmée watched her mum and dad ride for fun and got a bike to keep fit and as a hobby to do. While she was studying for her chemistry degree in Nijmegen, Esmée found herself not enjoying the daily train journey so instead made the 40 kilometre or so trip by bike.
Leaving early in the morning to avoid any rush, she fell more and more in love with the sport and soon joined the student club. From there she fully “caught the cycling bug” and did more and more racing, eventually joining a club team before making the step to Team DSM. That first year with the team [2021] was “really strange” for Esmée, as “everyone was already so used to the world of cycling” while she “was just like ‘woah’, at all of the new things” she was learning.