John Dean

John Dean was an outstanding all-round cyclist who was often unbeatable in New Zealand but struggled to find his best form overseas.

Dean, born in New Plymouth in 1947, competed at the 1968 and 1972 Olympics and the 1974 Commonwealth Games.

He won the overall sportsperson of the year award at the Taranaki Sports Awards in 1966, when he was only 18, and won both the New Zealand Road and Track Cyclist of the Year awards in 1967, while still a teenager.

He emerged from New Plymouth Boys’ High School a champion cyclist in the making and from 1963 set about scooping up the various national schoolboy and age cycling titles available to him. In 1964 he was named New Zealand Track Cyclist of the Year, having just turned 17.

Before he was done, he’d won eight New Zealand senior cycling titles in four disciplines – road 1967, track sprint 1968 and 1972, 1000m time trial 1968, 1972 and 1973, 10-mile (later 15km) track race 1968 and 1974. He also won the Tour of Southland in 1971. As a road cyclist, Dean, tall and rangy, was a superb sprint finisher, though not as strong as some on the hills. On the track he was versatile but possibly best suited to longer races.

Dean was three New Zealand Track Cyclist of the Year, in 1964, 1967 and 1972, to go alongside his 1967 Road Cyclist of the Year award.

Though Dean enjoyed good success in international races in New Caledonia, he was generally unable to find his best New Zealand form competing overseas.

At the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, he did not finish the road race.

By the time of the 1972 Munich Olympics, Blair Stockwell, Dean, Neil Lyster and Paul Brydon had formed the 4000m team pursuit squad, the first time New Zealand had entered the team pursuit at the Olympics. They were timed at a slick 4min 35.11s for their heat, but did not progress any further and finished 14th overall.

Dean also rode in the 1974 Christchurch Commonwealth Games. In the 10-mile scratch race he finished down the field, and in the 1000m time trial he was 10th of the 30 starters with a time of 1min 14.22s. In the sprint he lost in the first round to Ian Atherly of Trinidad and Tobago, but bounced back to beat Englishman Maurice Burton in the repechage. Into the second round he lost to Australian Greg Barnes and was then eliminated in the repechage, again by Atherly.

Over the years, Dean ran cycling shops, with mixed success, in Hamilton, Paraparaumu, the Sunshine Coast and Edinburgh. Having married a German woman, he moved to Germany, where he successfully ran cycling tours.